100 Kg Bag Of Ai Weiwei's "Kui Hua Zi" (Sunflower Seeds), On Display At Tate Turbine Hall, Sells At Sotheby's#
Ai Weiwei's "Kui Hua Zi" (Sunflower Seeds)
The presence of new Chinese collectors, both in person and over the phone, was felt yesterday at Sotheby's in London, where the Beijing-based artist (and asteroid namesake) Ai Weiwei sold well over high estimates alongside international artists like Andy Warhol, Juan Muñoz, and Franz Gertsch. A 100 kilogram bag of Ai's "Sunflower Seeds," which are currently on display at the Tate Modern's Turbine Hall in London, sold for £349,250 (US$560,476), nearly three times its high estimate of £120,000, to an anonymous bidder. As the Art Newspaper points out, the influence of increased Asian bidding continues to have a significant impact on the contemporary art world:
A young Asian private buyer, sitting at the back of the saleroom, bought Andy Warhol's Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup Box, 1986, for £445,250 (est £350,000-£450,000). After the sale, Sotheby's said that Asian buying accounted for 11% of the evening sale, which included buyers from 12 countries in total.
As for Ai Weiwei's sunflower seeds, three telephone bidders competed for the 220-pound lot. With its final sale price of $560,476, Sotheby's calculated that the anonymous buyer paid around £3.50 (or $5.60) per seed.
However, considering Ai Weiwei recently shared the top spot on ArtTactic's long-term Chinese artist longevity indicator with Cai Guo-Qiang, this is probably a good investment indeed.