Huge Hauser & Wirth Gallery said it sold a 1996 steel copy of Louise Bourgeois icon spider Sculpture for $40 million at Art Basel during the first VIP day of the Swiss exhibition.
The $40 million paid for the nearly 25-foot-tall work, which towers above the Hauser & Wirth booth, is the largest publicly reported for a bourgeois work. The gallery said it was sold by a private group, and that the statue was purchased by a private group. The spokesperson declined to provide any other identifying details, including the whereabouts of the seller or buyer.
spider Among the most expensive works in this year’s edition of Art Basel, the gallery where dealers often make some of their biggest sales.
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Bourjois auction record was set in 2019 when a bronze copy of spider-In 1997 and based on the steel version sold at Art Basel – sold at Christie’s for $32 million. associated smaller work, fourth spider (cast 1997), it was sold in April at Sotheby’s Hong Kong for HK$129.2 million ($16.4 million), becoming the most expensive statue ever sold in Asia.
Selling Art Basel’s work is also significant, as prices for female artists often lag behind their male contemporaries. In comparison, Andy Warhol Shot Blue Marilyn The movie (1964) became the most expensive work of art of the 20th century ever sold at auction when it sold last month at Christie’s New York to Larry Gagosian for $195 million. The three most expensive sculptures ever sold at auction are all by Alberto Giacometti, each going for over $100 million, with L’Homme au doigt (1947) sold at Christie’s, New York in 2015 for $141.3 million.
$40 million, Bourgeois spider It would fall right between the two most expensive women’s works ever sold at auction: Frida Kahlo in 1949 Diego the Yu for $34.9 million at Sotheby’s New York in 2021 and Georgia O’Keefe in 1932 Jimson Weed / White Flower No. 1 for $44.4 million at Sotheby’s New York in 2014.
Commenting on the exhibition’s upcoming 30th anniversary, Mark Piot, President of Hauser & Wirth, said in a statement: “Our pavilion is a celebration of both where we come from and where we’re headed: Louise Bourgeois’ remarkable 1996 sculpture ‘Spider’ – an icon of art twentieth century, now housed in an exceptional collection – anchors the catwalk and welcomes you to an oasis of artwork.”
Sales at art galleries such as Art Basel are reported by galleries themselves, making them difficult to verify independently, and works are often pre-sold prior to exhibition preview days, which attracts the world’s top collectors. (Hauser & Wirth declined to comment on when the work would be sold.)
In 2021, Lévy Gorvy, which has since merged to become the LGDR, reported that it had sold a huge painting to Joan Mitchell, 12 hawks at 3 am (circa 1962), priced at nearly $20 million for private collectors of Art Basel Hong Kong. earlier this year, artnet news mentioned that the work had already been sold a month before the fair, and that it had not been sold at the price the gallery had originally claimed.
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