Prints & Multiples - Online | August 2023

Menzies’ recent online auction of Prints & Multiples achieved impressive results for Australian and international prints, photography and sculpture, with competitive bidding between local and international collectors. The auction realised sales of 70.1% by volume and 108% by value for a total of $837,859 (including buyer's premium) – the second highest result for a sale of its kind in Australia.

The auction saw a new Australian auction record for American artist Alexander Calder, with the sale of Les Vagues (The Waves, from The Bicentennial Tapestries) 1975 for $58,909 (including buyer’s premium). Calder’s vibrant tapestry, created to mark the bicentenary of the American Revolution, sold for five times its pre-sale estimate of $8,000-12,000. The auction achieved an Australian record for Picasso ceramics, with the blue-and-white pitcher Cavalier et Cheval 1952 fetching $39,273 (including buyer’s premium) against an estimate of $20,000-30,000. Australian prints and sculpture by Cressida Campbell, Brett Whiteley and George Baldessin were also strongly contested.