There has been a bit of a recovery in the contemporary art market in recent weeks, witness the record sum achieved for the Giacometti statue!

However, further down the pecking order, some astonishing prices are still being achieved by the major sale rooms in their modern and contemporary auction sales. Take for example, Sotheby’s recent February 10th evening sale with a modest 47 lots, which achieved £18.6m together with 19 new artist records being achieved.

Much of the pre-sale publicity focused on a 1978 work by Lucian Freud (b. 1922) titled Self Portrait with a Black Eye, reputedly painted after an argument with a taxi driver, this eventually sold for £2.5m. However, the same vendor, bookmaker Victor Chandler had also consigned a second painting by Freud, this one being of the former jockey and antiques dealer Guy Hart with his Jack Russell Terrier, Speck. Chandler had previously bought this painting at Sotheby’s in July 1998 for “just” £150,000, but must have been delighted when his investment achieved £1.15m at the sale, indicating that there is still money to be made in today’s volatile markets!

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