Peter Phillips Makes Christie’s Modern British Sale Go Pop

Peter Phillips was a 22-year-old student at the Royal College of Art (RCA) when he took center stage in Ken Russell’s 1962 BBC TV documentary about London’s rising art stars.

More than 60 years after Pop Goes the Easel was first aired, a standout work from that year—Motorpsycho ACE—set Phillips’ new auction record, selling for $339,200 with fees, far above estimate at Christie's in London.

Other bright spots in its Modern British and Irish sales included works by Frank Auerbach and John Minton but overall the two sales on March 18-19 were below par. They scored a C- on the HENI Auction Index, down on the Christie's A- achieved last fall.

The HENI Auction Index is based on more than ten key metrics, including the number of lots on offer. At 165, this was 8% down on the average of comparable sales, while the total sales of $22m in real terms was down 38% on the average.

The number of lots that failed to find buyers and were bought-in was down by 3 percentage points, so a positive. While the number of withdrawn works was slightly up at 2.2%, 0.7 percentage points above average.

The percentage of works selling above their low estimate, at 78.2%, was higher than average in comparable sales by 6 percentage points. The 36.6 % of works that bettered their high estimate was down by 3.4 percentage points on the average, however.

The hammer to mid-estimate ratio was 1.2 and down slightly on Christie’s British and Irish sale last fall.

The percentage of works with strong or weak guarantees was in line with the norm.

The evening sale was led by Auerbach's Christmas Tree at Mornington Crescent (2004-5), which sold for $2.6m with fees. It is a characteristically expressionist cityscape of the scruffy area of north London where the artists lived and worked for much of his career.

The day sale was led by Minton’s 1952 portrait of his friend, the bodybuilder Spencer Churchill. Known as “Mr Muscles Unlimited,” he also posed for students at the RCA. Minton gifted him the portrait—depicting the fully clothed sitter—around the time the artist and the athlete traveled to Spain for a wrestling competition. The painting sold for $271,400 with fees, more than 400% above estimate.

Although billed as a British and Irish sale, only one of notable works in the day sale was by an Irish artist. John Lavery’s tender painting of his wife and daughters enjoying the morning sunshine on a winter’s day in Tangier in around 1910 sold for $271,400 with fees and just above its low estimate.

Methodology: for how the HENI Auction Index classifies sales, see here.