LONDON.- Converted from a live to an online auction, the Old Masters mid-season sale including Portrait Miniatures from the Pohl-Ströher Collection brought in a total of £3.4 million / $4.2 million, more than doubling its pre-sale estimate of £1.5-2.1 million to become the highest value online sale of Old Masters at Sotheby’s to date. The sale saw over 70% of lots exceeding their high estimates, with a strong sell through rate of 86% - a new record for a mid-season sale of Old Masters at Sotheby’s.

Top Lots
The auction was led by a depiction of Saint John the Baptist by Bernardo Zenale (Lot 7) which soared to £225,000/$279,900, setting a record for the artist and achieving more than 10 times its pre-sale estimate (£20,000-30,000) after more than 30 bids were placed online.

A Still Life work by Orsola Maddalena Caccia (Lot 28) set a new record for the artist, climbing to £212,500 /$264,350, more than 20 times its pre-sale estimate (£10,000-15,000).

Works from the esteemed Clarendon Collection, which until recently were on long-term loan to the Palace of Westminster, also performed well, with Cornelius Johnson’s portrait of Thomas, 1st Baron Coventry (Lot 64) selling for £87,500 over a pre-sale estimate of £30,000-50,000. Two works After Van Dyck, A Portrait of Philip Herbert, 1st Earl of Montgomery and 4th Earl of Pembroke (Lot 68) (£20,000-30,000) and Portrait of Algernon Percy, 10th Earl of Northumberland (Lot 65) (£20,000-30,000) also exceeded their estimates to achieve £87,500/$108,850 and £68,750/$85,525 respectively.

Works from the Pohl-Ströher Collection of Portrait Miniatures also obliterated their collective pre-sale estimate of £93,100-138,200 to achieve £508,250/$632,263, with all but one of the 72 lots finding buyers.

Statistics on Bidders & Buyers:

• Participants hailed from over 30 countries across the UK, North America, Europe, and Russia

• 27% of buyers were new to Sotheby’s

• Average 3 bidders per lot

• 8 bidders competed a 17th century portrait miniature of a gentleman from the Flemish school, which sold for £18,750 – over 23x its high estimate of £800 (Lot 124)

• 7 bidders chased Jan Josefsz van Goyen’s Landscape with fisherman tending fish traps, which achieved £125,000 – over 3x its high estimate (Lot 54)