"It was the sale of the season," said the NY Times. "A seminal Warhol — one of the artist’s first silk-screen paintings — came on the block at Sotheby’s auction of contemporary art it drew a closing bid of $43.7 million."
Warhols of all ages and subjects brought strong prices. A 1965 self-portrait with a top estimate of $1.5 million sold to Laurence Graff, the London jeweler, for $5.4 million. Warhol himself gave the work to Cathy Naso, who as a teenager in the mid-1960s worked after school in his legendary Factory.
Scared that it might get stolen, she had stashed it in the closet of her Connecticut home. As a result, its purple and red background colors were as brilliant as they were when it was painted, and collectors knew that. Mr. Graff, who sat in the first row of Sotheby’s salesroom on York Avenue, was not intimidated by five competing bidders.
“It’s a gem,” he said after the sale. “I came to New York for it and for the little Dora Maar,” he added referring to a Picasso painting at Sotheby’s last week. “And I am taking both home.”
On Wednesday, a 1957 Jasper Johns painting, “Gray Numbers,” drew a lot of interest. In 2003 Richard Hedreen, a Seattle collector, bought it for $5.2 million. On Wednesday it was estimated at as much as $7 million, and brought $8.7 million.
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