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Christie’s and Phillips Kept London’s June Auctions Moving But Not Flying

Following Sotheby’s record-setting Lewis Collection sale, the other major houses offered a more calibrated read of London’s June market with solid totals and fresh records but few signs of speculative excess.

The London sales opened with a record-setting £393.4 million night for Sotheby’s, led by the benchmark-shattering £273.6 million Lewis sale, which became not only the most expensive single-owner collection sold at auction but the highest result for an evening sale in Europe in more than a decade. It was a tough act to follow for the other major houses, particularly given that in 2024, Christie's restructured its summer season in London, limiting its marquee sales to October and March. Its summer sales also integrate categories while emphasizing broader cross-collecting strategies rather than relying on blockbuster evening auctions built around a few star lots or artist names. Yet it did have one thing going for it: a major consignment from the Zabludowicz Collection—one of the most influential art holdings in the U.K., estimated at £15 million.

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Anita and Poju Zabludowicz’s collection played a key role in the British art scene at a pivotal moment in its evolution. Today comprising more than 5,000 works, many acquired directly from artists’ studios, it is anchored in the British art scene of the 1990s and the rise of the Young British Artists, but extends to international artists the couple acquired early and who are now firmly established on the global stage. According to rumors, after years of championing emerging talent, they decided to sell as they grew apart from an art world whose dynamics they no longer recognized. (Or not. They and their daughter were spotted at Art Basel week, looking at work.)

The dedicated single-owner sale, Beyond Ordinary – Then. Now. Next. Works from the Zabludowicz Collection on June 25, squarely met its presale estimate, closing with a satisfying £15,448,081 ($20,453,259), with an 89 percent sell-through rate by lot and 97 percent by value, with three lots guaranteed and after three of the 56 lots were withdrawn (33, 37, 52). The top lot, Philip Guston’s 1977 work Mirror Head, sold just above its low estimate for £3.9 million.

Among the work by British artists, Antony Gormley’s Cloud XXXII, dated 2000 and acquired by the couple from his show at White Cube that same year, sold for £381,000, also just above its low estimate of £300,000, while Damien Hirst’s I Love You (1994-1995) squarely met its estimate, selling for £762,000. Mark Bradford’s Father South and Elsewhere also met expectations, selling for £1.27 million, as did Rashid Johnson’s Untitled Broken Crowd (2021), which landed at £952,500 against a £1.2 million high estimate. An additional Johnson sold a few lots later for £111,760, surpassing its £60,000-80,000 estimate. An iconic Richard Prince Cowboy, dated 1994, surpassed its high estimate, selling for £1,575,000. Originally debuting at Barbara Gladstone, the work was acquired by the couple from Thomas Dane for the Zabludowicz Collection in 2003.

The Zabludowicz sale opened with a work by Lubaina Himid—who’s representing the U.K. in........

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