Phillips’s modern and contemporary evening sales used to notch a long string of records for young artists, but those days are over, for now. On Tuesday night in New York, only three records were set—for the Danish Impressionist P.S. Krøyer, the American Abstract Expressionist Pat Passlof, and the British artist Joseph Yaeger, the lone living figure. No matter. The event trounced the performance of last year’s sale by essentially every metric.
Last May, for instance, just over 75 percent of the 40 lots slated for the marquee auction sold. This year, only two of its 43 lots were withdrawn, and everything else found a buyer. The final result more than doubled what Phillips brought in last year. Below, a rundown of the sale by the numbers.
Total Sales After Fees: $115.2 million
Total Sales of Equivalent Auction Last Year: $52 million
Hammer Total: $91.7 million
Top Seller: Andy Warhol’s Sixteen Jackies (1964), which sold for $16.2 million against an estimate of $15 million to $20 million.
Lots on Offer: 43
Lots Withdrawn: 2
Lots Sold: 41
Lots Bought In: 0
Sell-through Rate: 95.3 percent
Sell-through Rate After Withdrawals: 100 percent
Presale Low Estimate: $87.1 million
Presale Low Estimate After Withdrawals: $84.3 million
Hammer Total vs. Presale Low Estimate: +$4.6 million
Hammer Total vs. Presale Low Estimate (revised after withdrawals): +$7.4 million
Lots Guaranteed: 21
Lots With House Guarantees: 0
Lots With Third-Party Guarantees: 21
Total Low Estimate of Withdrawn Lots: $2.8 million
Total Low Estimate of Third-Party Guaranteed Lots: $61.7 million
Olga de Amaral, Umbra E (2015) Photo courtesy of Phillips.
Quote of the Night: “We work for the consignors here, ladies and gentlemen,” said auctioneer Henry Highley as the board behind him reverted the standing bid on Lee Bontecou’s critical two-dimensional work Untitled (1985-2001) from $3.35 million to $3.325 million—after getting ahead of itself amidst the lot’s excitement.
Lasting Memory: Just as the hammer came down on Olga de Amaral’s Umbra E (2015), someone on the phone with Phillips specialist Carolyn Kolberg—whom Highley had earlier referred to as “the architect of tonight’s sale”—advanced bidding from $1.25 million to $1.3 million. A sigh or two arose. “Kolberg-style, what can I say?” Highley joked.
Parting Shot: Guarantees and newly-launched priority bids seem to have helped Phillips achieve its strongest New York spring sale since it scored a $225 million haul on May 18, 2022. A representative from the house told me that as of January 2026, Phillips has noticed that approximately 40 percent of lots attract such advanced bids—compared with about 50 percent in this instance. “The market is alive and well,” stated Robert Manley, Phillips Chairman and Worldwide Head, Modern and Contemporary Art, after last night’s success. “It was a joy to present an Evening Sale that so wonderfully captures the strength, enthusiasm, and depth of the collecting community at every level.”
Next Sale Up: Fifteen minutes or so after Phillips concluded, Sotheby’s Modern Evening Auction commenced uptown.
