Photography Collection

Andreas Gursky is the highest priced of Bernd & Hilla Becher’s former art students and 97% of his auction revenue comes from the UK and the USA. Gursky has a pronounced appetite for monumental formats (some larger than 5 metres) in which individuals appear lost in the immensity of ordinary landscapes: supermarkets, stock markets or museums… he takes objective shots of the modern world and simultaneously produces breathtaking images. Unlike the work of his former teachers, 70% of Gursky’s work changes hands for prices above the € 10,000 line. His auction record stands at € 2.3m for a diptych measuring more than 3 metres. The photo entitled 99 cent II shows a saturated and highly constructed view of supermarket aisles. The diptych was sold on 7 February 2007 at Sotheby’s in London. Four months earlier, a similar example of 99 cent II was acquired for € 500,000 less at Phillips de Pury & Company, (16 November 2006). During this exceptional period of 2006/2007, Gursky’s work was fully implicated in the rapid ascension of Contemporary Art prices. In 2006 for example, his auction revenue was close to € 8m, a figure which corresponds to his combined auction revenue for 2003, 2004 and 2005! The € 3m total posted between July 2008 and June 2009 suggests a return of his market to a calmer rhythm, corresponding to his 2005 revenue just before the major speculative wave began. After a series of six auction results above the $1m between May 2006 and February 2008, the works proposed in 2009 at more than € 100,000 sold somewhat timidly and, at best, within their estimated price ranges. Gursky’s best auction results over recent months have been generated by pictures of the capitalist oases Dubai, Monaco and Shanghai. A view of Monaco sold for € 474,000 in February at Sotheby’s, a picture of Dubai World II fetched £ 370,000 (€ 434,000) and another of Shanghai went under the hammer for € 281,600 (25 June 2009, Sotheby’s). © artprice.com