Prices soar as gavel comes down on Noe art collection

Prices soar as gavel comes down on Noe art collection

By Jason Tedjasukmana

JAKARTA (JP): All doubts surrounding the prospects of the auction business in Indonesia were hammered away last week when Christie's disposed of every dish, drawing and dagger of the Adrian Noe estate.

Nothing was left to chance as a combination of conservative estimates, feverish bidding and the patience of Australian auctioneer Roger Mcllroy helped Christie's to raise US$1.7 million for the Adrian Noe Foundation.

In the moments prior to last Thursday's sale, the first conducted here by the London-based auction house, anticipation and mystery filled the room. Some 400 people registered to bid and prospective buyers came from as far away as Hong Kong and the U.K., setting the stage for Jakarta's first truly international auction.

The sale's first session, which gathered the collection's most important 95 lots, was not the stuff of neophytes. The three-hour event at Erasmus Huis may have been a first, but those in attendance were no strangers to auction.

Paddles flew up the moment the bidding began for the opening lot, a blanc-de-chine figurine sold for $5,500, nearly twice the estimate. The pattern continued, with the hammer routinely falling at two, three, four times the printed estimates. In one extraordinary case, two bidders locked into a contest for an unexceptional 19th-century Dutch colonial cabinet estimated at $1,500-2,000. Jaws dropped and heads turned until the madness was over at $40,000.

"There must have been gold in the drawers," murmured one woman in the room.

The success of the first 81 decorative works of art paved the way for the pictures that remained. With the auctioneer egging on the cash-happy crowd with reminders that all proceeds were going "to help the underprivileged children of Indonesia", the air was cleared for the evening's heavy hitters.

A mid-1970s Portrait of Han Groenewegen by Affandi quickly reached $40,000, and a sedate pastel by Dutch-born painter Rudolf Bonnet climbed to slightly above its high estimate to $22,000. The sale's star lot, an early Walter Spies oil from 1924 depicting the Dieng Plateau in Central Java, brought in the top price of $320,000. Though it fell short of the low estimate, the hammer price was solid evidence of the growing demand for works by the German-born painter, whose known oeuvre is said to number fewer than 100 paintings.

Going once

The mania failed to subside during the sale's second session the following day, when other unremarkable items became the objects of frenzied bidding. When a pair of Javanese keris estimated at $100-150 fetched $18,000, many in the room were left to wonder, What gives?

Names like Greta Garbo, Barbara Streisand and Jackie O (whose collection will be sold at Sotheby's in New York this Spring) carry an obvious cachet. Owning a set cookie jars once belonging to Andy Warhol is, for some, akin to acquiring a piece of the legend himself.

In the case of Adrian Noe, who died last year at the age of 75, the explanation is less obvious. The long-time Chase Manhattan banker and resident of Indonesia was known in corporate and government circles, yet he never gained widespread notoriety. In fact, his collection reflected the quiet determination of a humble man and his passion for Asian art. One sensed a surrogate family in the hundreds of objects that inhabited the home of the Dutchman, who never married or had children.

While some buyers may have been acquaintances of Noe's, most came for a selection of art rarely seen on the Indonesian market. The novelty factor also became apparent during the sale, as groups of chatty buyers reveled in their successful bids. But the charitable nature of the sale -- and no 15-percent buyer's premium -- was probably a key psychological incentive for the 200 active bidders to dig deeper into their pockets.

Fair play

Some of the entries in the catalog could have been more detailed to avoid confusion about why, for example, a set of East Javanese terracotta heads from the 15th century were estimated at $60-120. The fact that most believed them to be copies, however, didn't stop someone from paying $950.

But in general, the sale's success revealed a renewed confidence in the market. Christie's imprimatur and sober estimates based on objective price references allowed for a certain peace of mind. Dealers lost the upper-hand to transparency and international demand, though some of the ceramics and porcelain may have owed their generous prices to the collaboration of dealers trying to protect their market.

As Christie's expert in Southeast Asian works of art, Hugo Kreijger, explained, the arrival of outside expertise brings more knowledge to a market generally dominated by dealers and galleries.

"The precedent has been set. What remains is a move on the part of the Indonesian government to simplify export licensing procedures and other regulations which remain obstacles to the major auction houses."

Numerous visitors to the Noe estate reportedly agreed, expressing their interest in consigning possessions to auction. If the sale results are any indication, more will consider this avenue in the future.

Prospects

To prevent the loss of further tax revenues to places such as Singapore, where Christie's holds two sales of Southeast Asian art every year, the Indonesian government is trying to create a more hospitable climate for international auction houses.

According to new State Receivership Agency regulations passed last January, foreign companies may now set up wholly-owned private auction houses provided they are incorporated in Indonesia as a limited liability firm or a cooperative with a paid-up capital of Rp 1 billion (US$433,000). Private auction houses will also be required to submit 1.45 percent of the hammer price of movable assets and 2.275 percent of fixed assets to the government, in addition to income taxes.

Buyers and sellers at auction will remain subject to existing tax regulations. Apart from the auction house commissions, which can add up to 15% to the hammer price, buyers will be responsible for a value added tax.

During the sale, fears that national patrimony would be auctioned off to international buyers subsided as most Indonesian objects found Indonesian buyers. And, as Christie's explained prior to the sale, all monies would be refunded for those objects denied export licenses -- a fair condition for a country legitimately trying to protect its heritage, which the Ministry of Education loosely defines as any indigenous object over 50 years old.

Christie's execution of the Adrian Noe sale was the culmination of a process started two years ago, when its first team arrived in Jakarta for a free evaluation day at Erasmus Huis. The move is paying off. As competition for top collections between the two major auction houses intensifies in the United States and Europe, the emerging markets of Asia offer a wealth of potential buyers and numerous collections waiting to be unearthed.