Hammer Prices and Museum Purchases

At Bruun Rasmussen, we have just completed the year's first Live Auction, where we offered a long line of art, design, antiques, jewellery and wristwatches. The two auction weeks resulted in plenty of surprises, and a number of museums turned out to buy new works for their collections. In this article, you can read about some of the most impressive hammer prices.

The Children of the Golden Age and a Roman Marble Capital

As always, the auction commenced with the sale of fine art, and here C.A. Jensen's portrait from 1827 of three children from the influential Puggaard family achieved the highest hammer price of DKK 1,300,000 against an estimate of DKK 400,000-600,000. The following day, antiquities and antiques were up for auction, where a Roman marble capital surprised with a hammer price of DKK 380,000.

Major International Brands

The auction also presented precious diamond jewellery and wristwatches from the major international brands. A pair of diamond ear pendants from Cartier took flight with a hammer price of DKK 550,000, while a ticking marvel from Rolex, the Explorer model, went to a happy buyer for a hammer price of DKK 78,000.

From CoBrA to an Indian Dance

CoBrA art is in high demand at our auctions, and this time there was, for example, great interest in Carl-Henning Pedersen's "Løvemanden" (Lion Man) from 1950 and Asger Jorn's "Imbécilité sousdéveloppée" (Underdeveloped imbecility) from 1961, which achieved impressive hammer prices of DKK 1.2 and 1 million, respectively. The biggest surprise, however, was the Swedish-born American painter Brother Julius Olsson Nordfeldt's depiction of the Pueblo people's harvest dance from approx. 1920-35 with a hammer price of DKK 900,000 against an estimate of DKK 100,000.

The Egyptian and Judas

The two weeks of Live Auctions ended with a design sale, and here it was especially the architect Finn Juhl who had potential buyers submitting bids from all over the world. A dining room set consisting of 12 "Egyptian Chairs" and a "Judas Table" that were both designed in the late 1940s and manufactured by cabinetmaker Niels Vodder were sold at the staggering hammer prices of DKK 770,000 and DKK 250,000 respectively. The set was purchased in 1969 for DKK 12,500 by the same family who consigned it for the auction.

Museum-worthy Art

The Danish museums are regular customers at our auctions, and we update our list of these museum purchases on an ongoing basis. This time it was the Nivaagaard Collection that emerged victorious from the bidding war over the above-mentioned portrait of three children by C.A. Jensen, while the Odense City Museums purchased an original handwritten letter from H.C. Andersen from 1839. Museum Salling had set their sights on Christen Dalsgaard's portrait of an elderly woman from 1851, and the Gammel Estrup Museum brought home Carl Bøgh's motif of a fox on the prowl from 1870. The Museum of National History at Frederiksborg Castle added five works to their collection, including C.W. Eckersberg's painting "De tre Stænder, som paa Slotspladsen aflægge Troskabsed" (The social classes of the clergy, the nobility and the citizens & farmers swear an oath of allegiance to King Frederik III) from 1824.

Valuation and Consignment to Auction

We are once more looking for art, design, antiques, jewellery and wristwatches for the next Live Auction in late May. The deadline for consignments is in early April. We are open on all weekdays and Saturdays for a free and non-binding valuation at our locations in Copenhagen and Aarhus. You can also submit a photograph via our online valuation service at bruun-rasmussen.dk.