Iran holds the record for the highest number of lots to have gone under hammer this spring at these international auctions of modern and contemporary art. The country holds a new record for the works of art auctioned with a whopping 40 percent of the entire number of lots, peaking at approximately $5.116,952 (over 19 billion Iranian tomans). The spring season sales at these three auction houses peaked at $15,089,947 in total.
The lots included 83 masterpieces by 56 Iranian artists including Hossein Zenderoudi, Bahman Mohasses, Sohrab Sepehri, and Monir Shahroudi Farmanfarmayan. In total, 64 works of art out of this number went under the hammer and sold for well over $5 .1 million.
Art experts and collectors say the number of lots and the record works of art auctioned highlights fundamental change and sustainable demand, as prices for Iranian art are already rising at these auction houses. On the other hand, this demand for Iranian art is also reflecting a global trend of rising interest in modern work.
It is important to note that 10 works of art by Iranian artists alone were auctioned at $650,000 at Sotheby’s. It was one single work by Mohasses auctioned at $757,485 that helped Iran top the list at the auction house. He secured the second place after Zenderoudi. The third and fourth places went to four works of art auctioned at over $700,000 by Sepehri and three others by Farmanfarmayan.
At Bonham’s, more Iranian works of art went under the hammer – 17 in total. But with $200,000 short, they failed to match those auctioned at Sotheby’s. At Christie’s, the Iranian lots broke a new record - 14 works auctioned at over $3 million dollars, making the Christie’s the most important place for selling Iranian modern and contemporary art.
The biggest lots went to Hossein Zenderoudi, with 7 works auctioned at $1.525,625, or some 30 percent of all lots by Iranian artists. Other highlights include:
Sohrab Sepehri - $753,500
Monir Shahroudi Farmanfarmayan - $731,451
Bahman Mohasses - $757,485
Farhad Moshiri - $497,583
Manouchehr Yektai - $233,097
Parviz Tanavoli - $265,697
Kourosh Shishegaran - $162,500
Farideh Pashai - $111,818
Mohammad Ehsai - $100,000
Marco Gregorian - $87,500
Reza Derakhshani - $81,250
Nasrollah Afjei - $62,500
Nasser Osar - $56,673
Hossein Kazemi - $50,000
Bahman Dadkhah - $50,000
Tala Madani - $43,750
Abolghasem Saeidi - $37,500
Mohsen Vaziri Moghadam - $35,623
Jafar Rouhbakhsh - $35,623
Shirin Neshat - $32,385
Mehrdad Moheb-Ali - $30,000
Teymour Nasiri - $25,000
Angela Larian - $22,669
Roshanak Amin-Elahi - $20,000
Ali Shirazi - $17,811
Mohammad Bozorgi - $17,500
Shirin Aliabadi - $16,250
Shahriar Ahmadi - $11,334
Shadi Ghadirian - $10,000
Abbas Kiarostami - $10,000
Pouya Arianpour - $10,000
Sadegh Tirafkan – 10,000
In total, Iranian contemporary and modern artists had 46 out of 162 lots at Christie’s, 11 out of 60 lots at Sotheby’s, and 23 out of 74 lots at Bonham’s. Only 19 Iranian lots failed to find any buyers.
Interest in contemporary and modern Iranian art began to take off, first in the Middle East and then globally, after Christie’s held its first Dubai auction of Middle Eastern art in 2006.