Auctions and Shows Title + 26–29 November 2014 THEMA Sablon, Brussels 1 December 2014 Tribal Fashion Eve, Paris, Drouot Richelieu, Paris www.auctioneve.com 8 December 2013 The International Tribal Art Book Prize At Sotheby’s, Paris www.pilat2011.com 8 December 2014 Native American Art Bonhams, San Francisco www.bonhams.com 8 December 2014 Tribal Art Eve, Paris, Drouot Richelieu, Paris www.auctioneve.com 10 December 2014 African and Oceanic Art & Alexis Bonew and Congo Art Sotheby’s, Paris www.sothebys.com 10 December 2014 Tribal Art Artcurial, Paris www.artcurial.com 11 December 2014 African, Oceanic, and North American Art & “Force and Presence” Christie’s, Paris www.christies.com 15 December 2014 American Indian Art Eve, Paris, Drouot Richelieu, Paris www.auctioneve.com 14–18 January 2015 LA Art Show 2014 Los Angeles, CA www.laartshow.com 18 January 2015 Tribal Art Slawinski, Scotts Valley, CA www.slawinski.com 22–25 January 2015 Winter BRUNEAF 5 Brussels, Belgium www.bruneaf.com 24 January 2015 African and Oceanic Art Native, Brussels www.native-auctions.com 24 January–1 February 2015 BRAFA 2015 Brussels, Belgium www.brafa.be 27 January 2015 African and Oceanic Art Lempertz, Brussels www.lempertz.eu 31 January 2015 Tribal Art Objects from the Estate of the Nerlich Collection, Munich, Germany Zemanek-Münster, Würzburg www.tribal-art-auktion.de 5–8 February 2015 San Francisco Tribal & Textile Arts Show Fort Mason, San Francisco www.caskeylees.com 41 PORTRAIT OF A WORLD RECORD New York—On November 11, 2014, the world record for the sale of a single work of African art at auction was dramatically smashed when a renowned Senufo female figure brought $12,037,000 at the much-anticipated Myron Kunin sale at Sotheby’s in New York. It was one of five lots to break seven figures at this sale, which at $41,617,500 was itself the highest grossing sale of African art in US history. The Senufo figure is of a type most commonly referred to as a deble, that is, a primordial ancestral figure associated with the Poro initiatory organization. Probably originally part of a pair, these are generally publicly used only at the funerary ceremonies of high-ranking Poro members. The figure has been attributed to the Master of Sikasso, a sculptor whose proper name has been lost from memory but is believed to have worked in the Sikasso region of Burkina Faso in the late nineteenth and/or early twentieth century. Two other debles attributed to the Master of Sikasso are known, one in the collection of the Dallas Museum of Art and the other formerly in the renowned Helena Rubinstein Collection, which was sold at auction in 1966. Not documented before the 1950s, the Kunin deble may have emerged onto the African art market relatively late, although for Senufo sculpture this is not particularly unusual (see Fr. Michel Convers, “In the Wake of the Massa Movement Among the Senufo” in The World of Tribal Arts, spring 1997). However, it may well have been known earlier. The strongly comparable Rubinstein example* is known to have been collected in 1935 by French collector and dealer F. H. Lem. Over the years the Kunin piece has passed through the hands of some of the most notable connoisseurs of African art of the twentieth century: Emil Storrer, Werner Muensterberger, William Rubin, Armand Arman, and Alain de Monbrison, before it entered the Kunin Collection in 1999. It has been exhibited and published more than the vast majority of other works of African art. Why a record price for this piece rather than another? In addition to its solid foundation of artistic attribution, notable provenance, extensive exhibition and publication history, and—honestly speaking—highly effective marketing, it is, quite simply, a masterpiece of world art. This is a fact that has been recognized by its past owners and, judging by the price paid, confirmed by its present one. Right: Female figure, deble. Senufo, Côte d’Ivoire or Burkino Faso. Late 19th or early 20th century. Wood. H: 92.1 cm. Sold at Sotheby’s, New York, on November 11, 2014, for $12,037.000. * Sold for $27,000 at the 1966 Parke-Bernet Rubinstein sale ($2,000 less than the Bangwa Queen at the same sale) and for $1,212,500 at a 1995 Christie’s sale. The Kunin deble was last at public auction in 1991 at Sotheby’s, where it brought $1,017,500. 41 31
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