NEW YORK, NY.- After being exhibited at 47 locations around the globe, Ai Weiwei’s celebrated Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads (2010) series has returned to the city where it was first launched—New York—and will hit the auction block. The Zodiac Heads: Gold will be on exhibition and display at Sotheby’s headquarters until it goes up for auction on November 15, 2019 as part of the Sotheby’s Contemporary Art Day Sale.

Prices for the Zodiac Heads: Gold have ranged between $3,500,000 to $4,500,000 USD. One recent collector who purchased Ai Weiwei’s Zodiac Heads: Gold series at auction was the American tech billionaire Sean Parker, the Founding President of Facebook. Parker bought the work for a record-breaking $4.4 million USD at Phillips London in February 2015. This season Sotheby’s has estimated the Zodiac Heads: Gold to sell for between $2,500,000 and $3,500,000 USD.

The Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads: Bronze and Gold series has been touring internationally to great fanfare since their debut at the historic Pulitzer Fountain in New York City in May 2011. During the official opening the Zodiac Heads were inaugurated by former mayor Michael Bloomberg who praised the work and lauded Ai Weiwei’s devotion to free expression and human rights. He spoke enthusiastically while flanked by a group of art world illuminati—including Julian Schnabel, Shirin Neshat and Bill T. Jones, among others—setting the stage for the Zodiac Heads to travel onward and inspire millions of people far and wide.

Remarkably Ai Weiwei himself was not able to see Zodiac Heads during its inaugural presentation nor for several years following—the artist was detained in April 2011 (just a month before the launch of the series in New York) and he was held in secret captivity in Beijing for 81 days. Upon his release later that summer, the Chinese government confiscated his passport and he was unable to leave China for nearly four years. The artist received his passport back in July 2015 and has since been living and travelling abroad. Regardless of the complex and compelling narrative that is Ai Weiwei’s life story, the Zodiac Heads are greatly admired by all walks of life.

The Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads: Bronze and Gold series has been exhibited at major cities worldwide including São Paulo, Brazil; London, England; Los Angeles, CA; Taipei, Taiwan; Houston, TX; Kyiv, Ukraine; Washington, D.C.; Toronto, Canada; Miami, FL; Cleveland, OH; Mexico City, Mexico; Princeton, NJ; Chicago, IL; Jackson Hole, WY; Malaga, Spain; Paris, France; Montreal, Canada; San Diego, CA; East Hampton, NY; Moscow, Russia; Dallas, TX; Berlin, Germany; Oxfordshire, England; Palm Springs, CA; Skovvej, Denmark; Portland, OR; Phoenix, AZ; Prague, Czech Republic; Sacramento, CA; Boston, MA; Pittsburgh, PA; Melbourne, Australia; Tucson, AZ; and Reno, Nevada; Sarasota, FL; Denver, CO; West Bretton, England and Hamburg, Germany, among other locations.

The history of ancient zodiac sculptures continues to enchant and enrage—designed in the 18th century by two European Jesuits serving in the court of the Qing dynasty [1644 – 1911] Emperor Qianlong, the twelve zodiac animal heads originally adorned a fountain and functioned as a clock in the magnificent European gardens of the Yuanming Yuan. In 1860, the Old Summer Palace was ransacked by French and British troops and the heads were pillaged. As the decades passed, only seven of the original twelve heads were recovered, while five remain missing to this day. By re-interpreting these traditional objects in a contemporary context, Ai Weiwei’s Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads series focuses attention on the looting, profiteering and eventual repatriation of art. This work also represents his continued exploration of the past and the so-called ‘fake’ and the ‘copy’ in relation to the original.

A highly regarded contemporary artist and activist, Ai Weiwei regularly exhibits his work in prominent museums, cultural institutions and galleries around the world. His art is included in numerous permanent museum collections, including The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles; The Tate, London; Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, Japan; and the Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art, Queensland, Australia. More than a decade ago Ai Weiwei worked closely with Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron to design the 2008 National Olympic Stadium (the “Bird’s Nest”).