Christie’s Paris Scores Big with Lalanne’s Giant Apple

Claude Lalanne was the star of Christie’s spring sales in Paris. The French sculptor’s monumental La Pomme de New York, or New York Apple, sold for $7.1m with fees, well above its high estimate to lead its 20th/21st evening sale last week.

Previously seen on New York’s Park Avenue and at Versailles, the giant bronze, which is number seven of an edition of eight, was a guest of the Bristol Hotel in Paris during the auction house’s Impressionist, modern and contemporary sales.

The auction house held five sales on April 15 to 16 that totaled $92.3m, eclipsing the total Sotheby’s achieved in its two auctions held the same week in the city. Christie’s scored a B- on the HENI Auction Index, matching its competitor's improved grade.

The index is based on more than ten metrics and so includes more than sales totals, number of lots and sell-through rates to evaluate auction performance.

Christie’s sales total was 11% above the average of comparable sales but it was 16% down on its most recent comparable sales in the French capital.

There were 347 lots consigned to the sales, nearly 10% above the norm and a 5% increase on its most recent sales.

The improvement in works selling above their low estimates also helped the auction score a B- grade, up from a C+. They rose nearly 4 percentage points against the historic average but the share selling above their high estimate was down slightly by 1.5 percentage points.

One work that soared beyond its high estimate was another piece by Claude Lalanne: a set of decorative doors she created for a 2010 exhibition at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris showcasing her work alongside that of her partner, François-Xavier. The work sold for $1.34 million including fees.

Some 42 works were backed by a guarantee. The share of those with strong guarantees was up by more than 4 percentage points but those with weak guarantees also increased slightly by just over 3 percentage points.

The 11% of works bought-in was up by more than 3 percentage points on the norm. The four works withdrawn were in line with the norm.

A single-collection sale of works on paper totaled $18.4m with fees and was led by a late watercolor by Cezanne of his wife, Hortense. Seated Woman (Madame Cézanne) (1902), which had a guarantee, sold for $4.66m with fees.

Another late work on paper, this time by Vincent van Gogh, led the Impressionist and modern sale. His 1980 sketch of pea pickers on the front and a landscape on the back sold for $1.43m with fees, 11 times its low estimate.

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