Getty Museum Acquires Previously Unknown Metsys Painting, and Ancient Mosaic Tiles Returned to Turkey

The J. Paul Getty Museum has acquired the Netherlandish painter Quentin Metsys’s “Christ as the Man of Sorrows” (c. 1520–30). For centuries, the painting has been in a private collection, previously unknown to art historians. “This discovery adds a major masterwork both to the artist’s oeuvre and to the Getty Museum’s paintings collection,” said Timonthy Potts, director of the Getty Museum. “It ranks among our most important 16th-century Northern European paintings and is already attracting much attention from scholars of this period.” The painting was exported from Germany to the UK, and according to the press release, the Getty Museum purchased the painting in a private sale. The work will go on view for the first time in modern history in the spring of 2019 at the Getty Museum, Getty Center. [via email announcement]

The Getty Research Institute has acquired a collection of hundreds of rare books, prints, and manuscripts related to the culinary arts in the 15th through 19th centuries. The works were assembled by “culinary authority” Anna Willan and her husband Mark Cherniavsky in the Anne Willan and Mark Cherniavsky Gastronomy Collection, according to the press release. Willan is also making a donation to support the Cherniavsky Library Research Grants, which encourage research related to antiquarian books and culinary studies. [via email announcement]

The San Antonio Museum of Art has received a gift of over 850 photographs from collectors Marie Brenner and Ernest Pomerantz. The photographs span from the 1920s through the 1930s, showing scenes from the Great Depression, World War II, the Civil Rights Movement, and more. The photographs include works by artists Dmitri Baltermants, Ilse Bing, Paul Caponigro, Henri Cartier-Bresson, W.E. Dassonville, Mike Disfarmer, Leonard Freed, Danny Lyon, Joel Meyerowitz, Arthur Rothstein, Stephen Shore, and Louis Clyde Stoumen, among others. Some of the photos will be on display in the exhibition Capturing the Moment: Photographs from the Marie Brenner and Ernest Pomerantz Collection from February 22 through May 12, 2019. [via email announcement]

The city of Cologne, Germany has received 438 works by the Jewish painter Otto Schloss, from his heirs. The works include drawings, watercolors, and prints, which have been donated to the Cologne NS Documentation Center. Schloss moved to Cologne in the early 1920s and worked as an illustrator of newspapers and books until he fled from the Nazis to Sweden in 1938.

The Museum Für Moderne Kunst (MMK) has acquired Joseph Beuys’s “Boxkampf für direkte Demokratie [Boxing Match for Direct Democracy]” (1972). In 1972 during Documenta 5 in Kassel, Germany, a boxing match was staged at the Museum Fridericianum between Beuys and art student Abraham David Christian. Beuys, at this time in Kassel, was “untiringly discussing the party system and the issue of direct democracy by referendum, with the exhibition visitors,” according to the press release. The Office for Direct Democracy was “his artistic contribution.” Christian had challenged Beuys to a boxing match during an argument, and the match took place on October 8, 1972. Inside the “Thinking Room,” by artist Ben Vautier, a boxing ring had been set up and the two artists fought. Beuys won the match and thus created a sculpture out of this experience — “Boxing Match for Direct Democracy.” The purchase was made possible through Hessische Kulturstiftung, Kulturstiftung der Länder, Ernst Max von Grunelius-Stiftung, Georg und Franziska Speyer’sche Hochschulstiftung, ING, Deka and Freunde des MMK.

The Bilbao Fine Arts Museum in Bilbao, Spain has acquired Richard Serra’s sculpture “Bilbao” (1983). The work was donated in memory of Martín García-Urtiaga and Mercedes Torrontegui by their grandchildren. The site-specific work was created in its namesake city and remained outside the museum for two years until it was purchased by collector Plácido Arango and moved to Madrid. In 2001, the work was again temporarily displayed in the museum for a time, and now, it is back in the same space it originally occupied.

Bowling Green State University (BGSU) is returning 12 ancient mosaic tiles to the Republic of Turkey. The university bought the tiles in good faith in 1965 for about $35,000. The tiles were thought to have originated in the ancient city of Antioch, which is modern-day Turkey, but in 2012, Dr. Stephanie Langin-Hooper, then a BGSU faculty member, working with Dr. Rebecca Molholt of Brown University, discovered that the mosaics originated in the ancient city of Zeugma, also in modern-day Turkey. The research raised questions about the origin, and it was discovered that the tiles were removed through unauthorized excavation and put on the international art market. The tiles have been removed from BGSU’s Wolfe Center for the Arts, and a delegation from Turkey was on hand to take them home. In their place, the university will display replicas of the tiles, and the original mosaics will be exhibited at the Zeugma Mosaic Museum in the city of Gaziantep.

Sotheby’s Brushwork II — Abstract Masters sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 158,537,000 Hong Kong dollars (HKD) (~$20,250,000) on November 24. The sale’s top lot, Zao Wou-Ki’s “10.1.68” (1968), sold for 68,932,000 HKD (~$8,805,000).

Sotheby’s Russian Pictures sale in London brought in a total of £13,425,525 (~$17,121,000) on November 27. The sale’s top lot, Konstantin Egorovich Makovsky’s “Blind Man’s Bluff,” sold for £4,287,400 (~$5,468,00).

Sotheby’s Collections sale in Paris brought in a total of €1,704,064 (~$1,939,000) on November 27. The sale’s top lot, a large Italian silver fountain, Guido Fiorentini, Milan, circa 1950, sold for €62,500 (~$71,000).

Sotheby’s Russian Works of Art, Fabergé & Icons sale in London brought in a total of £5,412,563 (~$6,948,000) on November 27. The sale’s top lot, a monumental silver-gilt and cloisonné enamel kovsh, Feodor Rückert, Moscow, 1908–1917, sold for £490,000 (~$629,000).

Sotheby’s Rostropovich – Vishnevskaya: The Private Collection sale in London brought in a total of £4,181,125 (~$5,367,000) on November 28. The sale’s top lot, Giovanni Battista Guadagnini’s “A Cello, Turin” (1783), sold for £1,930,000 (~$2,478,000).

Christie’s sale of Fine Chinese Modern Paintings in Hong Kong brought in a total of 325,512,500 HKD (~$41,576,000) on November 26–27. The sale’s top lot, Zhang Daqian’s “Jiatu map” (1943), sold for 58,600,000 HKD (~$7,485,000).

Christie’s Beyond Compare: A Thousand Years of the Literati Aesthetic evening sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 717,310,000 HKD (~$91,619,000) on November 26. The sale’s top lot, Su Shi’s “Wood and Rock,” sold for 463,600,000 HKD (~$59,214,000).

Christie’s Chinese Contemporary Ink sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 19,567,500 HKD (~$2,499,000) on November 26. The sale’s top lot, Liu Kuo-Sung’s “Ama Dablam” (2008), sold for 2,620,000 HKD (~$335,000).

Christie’s Exquisite Eye: Chinese Paintings online sale brought in a total of 5,403,750 HKD (~$690,000) on November 19–26. The sale’s top lot, Zhang Shizhao’s “Calligraphy in Running Script” (1941), sold for 375,000 HKD (~$48,000).

Christie’s sale of Important Russian Art in London brought in a total of £7,145,625 (~$9,099,000) on November 26. The sale’s top lot, a magnificent, monumental, and extremely rare imperial porcelain vase by the Imperial Porcelain Factory, St. Petersburg, period of Nicholas I (1836), sold for £1,808,750 (~$2,303,000).

Christie’s sale of Asian 20th Century Art (day sale), including a selection of Japanese woodblock prints from private collections in Hong Kong brought in a total of 120,216,750 HKD (~$15,354,000) on November 25. The sale’s top lot, Zao Wou-Ki’s “05.04.63” (1963), sold for 6,100,000 HKD (~$779,000).

Christie’s Asian Contemporary Art day sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 61,297,500 HKD (~$7,829,000) on November 25. The sale’s top lot, Liu Ye’s “Reading Girl” (2008), sold for 5,740,000 HKD (~$733,000).

Christie’s sale of Gold Boxes in Hong Kong brought in a total of 7,332,500 HKD (~$937,000) on November 25. The sale’s top lot, a Swiss jeweled, enameled musical gold snuff-box with an automaton, “The Music Lesson,” sold for 2,250,000 HKD (~$287,000).

Christie’s Asian 20th Century & Contemporary Art evening sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 424,250,000 HKD (~$54,185,000) on November 24. The sale’s top lot, Zao Wou-Ki’s “22.07.64,” (1964), sold for 115,975,000 HKD (~$14,812,000).

Phillips’s 20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 102,746,000 HKD (~$13,131,000) on November 25. The sale’s top lot, Yayoi Kusama’s “Pumpkin (three works)” (2002), sold for 20,500,000 HKD (~$2,619,000).

Christie’s online sale of Modern/British & Irish Art brought in a total of £776,250 (~$989,000) on November 16–23. The sale’s top lots, Jack Vettriano’s “Study for ‘Bluebird at Bonneville’” (1951) and Jack Vettriano’s “Heaven on Earth” (1999), sold for £43,750 (~$56,000) each.

Christie’s online sale of Contemporary Art Asia: Hong Kong Edition brought in a total of 2,424,000 HKD(~$310,000) on November 20–27. the sale’s top lot, Yue Minjun’s “Untitled (Portrait)” (2007), sold for 237,500 HKD (~$30,000).

Christie’s The Meiji Aesthetic: Selected Masterpieces from a Private Asian Collection sale in Hong Kong brought in a total of 16,512,500 HKD (~$2,109,000) on November 27. The sale’s top lot, an important iron articulated sculpture of an eagle on stand, Meiji Period (c. 1894), signed “Shinjiro,” sold for 6,700,000 HKD (~$856,000).

Christie’s Post-War & Contemporary Art sale in Amsterdam brought in a total of €8,078,500 (~$9,186,000) on November 26–27. The sale’s top lots, George Baselitz’s “Sujet populaire contraire (Contrary popular subject)” (2007) and Asger Jorn’s “Myr og Mo (Myra and Mo)” (1950–1952), sold for €391,500 (~$445,000) each.

Christie’s The Exceptional Sale in Paris brought in a total of €3,326,000 (~$3,782,000) on November 27. The sale’s top lot, Bernardino Luini’s “Une figure de sainte, en buste, avec une palme et lisant les Ecritures [A figure of saint, in bust, with a palm and reading the scriptures],” sold for €1,207,500 (~$1,373,000).

Christie’s Latin American Art online sale brought in a total of $495,125 on November 16–28. The sale’s top lot, Rubén Alpízar’s “Untitled” (2017) from the series Pequeños vinculos, sold for $32,500.

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