Record-breaking auctions
Auctions are traditionally the arena in which some of the world’s most famous and valuable items change hands. The world’s most prestigious auction houses have become a space in which the theatre of trade plays out in the most direct way possible.
Works of art are fetching massive sums at auction more and more often. Art is increasingly seen as a prudent investment, and allows buyers to make a statement not just about their wealth, but about their taste and, with modern art, the fact that they “get it”. Painted in 1905 by Picasso, ‘Boy with a Pipe (The Young Apprentice)’ sold for a record-breaking $104.1 million in 2004. In February 2010, Giacometti’s ‘Walking Man I’ sculpture sold for $104.3 million, and, in May 2010, the record price for a piece of art was broken again when Picasso’s ‘Nude, Green Leaves and Bust’, which he painted in a single day, sold for $106.5 million.






