While this winter’s premier auctions for Old Master works at Christie’s and Sotheby’s in New York yielded better results year-over-year, overall sales totals failed to live up to the pre-sale estimates set by the auction houses.

Christie’s New York staged a bumpy and uneven Old Master sale on Wednesday (6 January), making $19.5m ($24.4m with fees), just shy of its revised pre-sale estimate of $22.2m to 33.2m after four withdrawals. Still, the sale far exceeded last January’s anemic result of $10.9m ($13.7m with fees).

The sombre yet impressively outfitted Portrait of George the Bearded, Duke of Saxony attributed to Lucas Cranach I and workshop sold for $260,000 ($327,600 with fees), settling a restitution dispute over ownership between the Allentown Art Museum and the heirs of Henry and Hertha Bromberg, whose forebears acquired the oil-on-panel work in 1917 and were forced to flee Nazi Germany in the 1930s. The museum acquired the work in 1961 from an unnamed New York gallery.

Joachim Anthonisz Wtewael’s large-scale Adam and Eve (around 1610-15) sold to a telephone bidder for $1.65m ($2m with fees) against a $1m to $1.5m estimate. The work was based on Albrecht Dürer’s iconic engraving from 1504. Switching to still life, Pieter Claesz’s A peeled lemon on a pewter plate, a pewter wine jar, a roemer, gooseberries and red currants in a dish, a knife, on a partially draped table (1632) brought in a below-estimate $575,000 ($724,500 with fees). The work had been in the same private collection since 1980.

A sans workshop-aided work by Lucas Cranach I, Hercules and Omphale (1532), sold to another anonymous telephone bidder for $1.5m ($1.8m with fees) against an estimate of $1m to $2m. In the painting, the artist’s serpent device is a substitute for his signature and the work features the demigod Hercules, still amorous but outfitted in women’s clothing as slavish punishment from Omphale, the Queen of Lydia.

The would-be star of the sale—and possibly the whole Old Masters week, at least estimate-wise—was Doménikos Theotokópoulos’s (better known as El Greco) dramatic Saint Sebastian, which portrays the saint as a willowy, mostly nude figure pierced by six arrows and looking heavenward in surprisingly rapturous calm. It was estimated by Christie’s to sell for between $7m and $9m. The painting was withdrawn at the 11th hour after legal wrangling by representatives of the prime minister of Romania over claims the long-ago King Carol I was the rightful owner.

Christie’s issued a statement late Tuesday without any specific reference to Romania: “We received an inquiry about the work. Christie’s takes these matters seriously and out of an abundance of caution is withdrawing the lot at this time. We look forward to selling this unique and spectacular work at a later date.” The withdrawn painting was last acquired privately for the seller by the now-disbanded art advisory powerhouse Giraud Pissarro Segalot in 2010 for an undisclosed price.

Back in the salesroom, Johann Georg Platzer’s jam-packed and multi-figured An artist’s studio in oil on copper, originally gifted to a Russian empress and later sold to the dealer Bob P. Haboldt, fetched $130,000 ($163,800 with fees).

The sole woman artist on the roster turned heads, but ultimately Elisabeth Vigée Le Brun’s seated Portrait of a woman traditionally called Mademoiselle George three-quarter length (after 1800) failed to meet its undisclosed reserve and was bought in at $95,000. In another and more successful femme fatale vein, Francois Boucher’s reclining nude, Sleeping Diana, portrays the goddess of the hunt wearing her headdress and quiver of arrows snugly fit beneath her arm. The painting realised $1.2m ($1.5m with fees) against a $1.2m to $1.8m estimate.

Jan Both’s drama-filled An Italianate Landscape with Bandits Leading Prisoners (around 1650) was deaccessioned by the Museum of Fine Arts Boston and failed to find a buyer; it was bought in at a $720,000 chandelier bid.

“It was a mixed bag and mixed result, and we got two things very reasonably, so there’s always something that drops,” said Edmondo di Robilant from Robilant + Voena. The dealer snagged Charles-Antoine Coypel’s Portrait of of a man in a painted frame (1781) for $50,000 ($63,000 with fees) against a $120,000 to $180,000 estimate, along with Luca Giordano’s rather stunning and large-scale Samson and Delilah (late 1650s) for $65,000 ($81,900 with fees), far less than its $150,000 to $250,000 estimate. It last sold at Sotheby’s London in July 1997 for £199,500 ($336,879 with fees).

‘Getting works in all areas to the auction block is harder than ever’

On Thursday (6 February), the first part of Sotheby’s Master Paintings & Sculpture sale came on deck and delivered a stronger $23.3m ($27.5m with fees) result against a pre-sale estimate of $25.2m to $37.2m. It comfortably surpassed the February 2024 sale’s tally of $16.8m ($21m with fees), even after six last-minute withdrawals. Still, the sale registered a battle-weary sell-through rate of 59.2%. Three lots came backed by house guarantees and six by irrevocable bids, also known as third-party guarantees.

Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, attributed to the workshop of Sandro Botticelli, drew in three bidders and realised $550,000 ($660,000 with fees) against an estimate of $100,000 to $150,000. The work was deaccessioned by the Bass Museum in Miami Beach to benefit the John and Johanna Bass Art Acquisition Fund.

Still on the religious front, Raffaello Sanzio or Raphael completed the contemplative and barefoot Saint Mary Magdalene (around 1503) when he was only 20 years old. The painting sold to an anonymous telephone bidder for $2.6m ($3.1m with fees) against a $2m to $3m estimate. It came to market backed by a third-party guarantee. The consignor acquired it at Christie’s New York in May 2000 for $611,00 with fees, when it was titled Saint Mary of Egypt.

Sir Peter Paul Rubens’s oil sketch Annunciation (around 1628-29) is modestly scaled but brimming with bravura content. It features Mary with the angel Gabriel fluttering above her and sold to Patrick Williams of New York’s Adam Williams Fine Art for $4m ($4.8m with fees) against a $4m to $6m estimate. It last sold at Sotheby’s London in 2014 for considerably more, £3.1m ($5.4m) including fees.

A familiar-looking Hercules at the Court of Omphale (1533) attributed to Lucas Cranach the Elder and workshop—quite similar (though larger) to the one that sold on Wednesday at Christie’s for twice the price—sold to another telephone bidder for $700,000 ($840,000 with fees). Still outfitted in women’s clothing and slavishly spinning thread, this time Hercules is grabbing the backside and breast of two of the ladies-in-waiting.

Back to single-figure portraiture, Jacopo Tintoretto’s Portrait of a Young Man Wearing a Fur-lined Cloak (around 1548) was last publicly seen at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC’s exhibition Tintoretto of Renaissance Venice in 2019. At Sotheby’s this week, it realised $1.8m ($2.1m with fees). Leaning against an elaborately carved column depicting acanthus leaves, the titular figure stares out confidently, perhaps contemptuously at the viewer.

Bernardino de’ Conti’s sombre though elaborately dressed Portrait of an elegantly Attired Noblewoman in Profile (around 1500) came with a third-party guarantee and loped to a $2.8 m ($3.1m with fees), an auction record for the Milanese painter in Leonardo’s circle.

Backed by a full-on house guarantee, Spagna’s exquisite and calming Madonna and Child in a Verdant Landscape (around 1510) stumbled and went unsold at $380,000 against an estimate of $800,000 to $1.2m.

Another guaranteed entry was Pieter Brueghel the Younger’s action-packed Nest Robber (after 1616), which depicts in part a young peasant climbing a tree to snatch his bounty, sold to a telephone bidder for $2.5m ($3m with fees). The painting was consigned by the Swiss collectors Hans and Marion König.

One of the more sought-after works, and another König lot insured with an irrevocable bid, Cornelis de Vos’s Portrait of a Young Girl at a Virginal (around 1625-30) raced to $1.7m ($2m with fees) against an estimate of $600,000 to $800,000. The couple acquired it in 1985 from the Richard Green Gallery in London.

A second Sotheby’s Master Paintings sale realised $2.8m ($3.3m with fees), somewhat shy of its $3.2m to $4.6m pre-sale estimate.

While Sotheby’s had something to crow about this round, London-based and seasoned art adviser Morgan Long observed after the first sale: “All the markets are tough to sell and getting works in all areas to the auction block is harder than ever.”

Another kind of Old Master topped all others this week: the rare-to-market Joachim-Ma Stradivarius violin, hand-crafted by Antonio Stradivari in Cremona, Italy in 1714. The violin, with a still-stunning amber gold varnish, sold at Sotheby’s on Thursday afternoon in a one-off auction for $10m ($11.3m with fees), breaking the record for the highest price ever achieved for a musical instrument at auction. The proceeds will endow scholarships at the New England Conservatory.