Bonhams' Giles Peppiatt, in South Africa on a final hunt for work for his firm's auction in London on 21 March 2012, reckons that it was more a case of buyers sitting on their hands at a particularly difficult stage of the international financial crisis than an intrinsic collapse in demand, but concedes that this year's pipe-opener will be less ambitious than last year.
He doubts that any individual lots will be valued at more than £400 000-£600 000, and while the final figure is yet to be determined expects the low estimate to be no more than around half last year's £10 million - which was inflated by the Irma Stern Arab Priest that fetched a record £3 million. It may be significant, too, that the house has not scheduled the customary curtain-raising sale of lesser work at its Knightsbridge premises on the eve of the main sale, though Peppiatt says it's not yet been decided whether to hold a separate masterpieces session.
Stephan Welz wouldn't be drawn on a figure, but confirms that his firm's estimates are also slightly more conservative and that they would be bluffing themselves if they think the market is insatiable, repeating a point that's been made before, that the previously strong market brought a lot of stock out of suburban living rooms.
Strauss & Co, while leapfrogging Stephan Welz & Co for the first local sale of the year, is also lowering its sights, the low estimate for its sale on Monday, 6 February, as usual at Cape Town's Vineyard Hotel, being about R23.3 million, only 40% of last year's R58.7million. There are only three seven-digit estimates: R8 -12 million for a Stern portrait of an Arab woman (the inside front
cover), R2.8 - R3.5 million for a Pierneef landscape, and R2.5 - R3.5 million for a Stern portrait of two seated Arabs.
The top estimates (with a low estimate of R300 000 and upwards) also includes R700 000-R900 000 for Stanley Pinker's Bathers (the inside back cover), R600 000-R900 000 for a William Kentridge head, R350 000-R400 000 for Wolf Kibel's Three Women (the frontispiece), a clutch of lots on R300 000-R400 000 - a Hugo Naude landscape, another Pierneef, two Maggie Laubscher landscapes and two Stanley Pinkers, one of them the front cover - and another Kentridge head on R300 000-R400 000. The frontispiece to the evening session is a Naude landscape of Jaffa, estimated at R250 000-R350 000.
Most represented artist in the 204 lots is Walter Battiss, with 15 lots, mostly low-priced, followed by Naude and Cecil Higgs (nine each), Robert Hodgins (seven), Kentridge, Tinus de Jongh and Gregoire Boonzaaier (six each) and Terence McCaw, Pierneef, Pinker, Alexander Rose-Innes and Stern (five each).
Stephan Welz & Co's Cape sale is on 21 and 22 February. After these testers, the focus will move to Johannesburg, with sales from both major local houses in the ensuing couple of months. Bonhams' major 2012 sale comes much later, in October, though rather earlier in the month than previously.
