All those who ever wished to take Kate Moss home would have bid for a collection of artworks of the British model at Christie’s. The auction of Gert Elfering’s 58 pieces, mostly photographs, attracted worldwide attention and admiration.
Of the whole lot, the glass-reinforced composite 2013 sculpture, ‘A model Model’, fetched the highest amount that evening. Created by Allen Jones, this 185 cm tall figurine sold for 133,875 pounds (about $215,000). Sporting painted details, it is signed, dated and numbered ‘no. 1’ in ink on the inside. Only six such sculptures will be made. Allen Jones expressed “For some time, I have made sculptures that look like women. Here was an opportunity to make a woman look like my sculpture.”
The second highest bid was called out for Jones’s oil painting, ‘Kate in red.’ This 2013 creation went for £121,875 (about $195,000) and is signed, titled and dated in ink on the edge of canvas. The artist speaks of his muse, “As a model, Kate has become a commodity. For the media she is news, and for artists she is now subject matter.” Allen was commissioned to create the painting and sculpture of the supermodel for Christie’s auction.
And Chris Levine’s She’s Light (2013) went under the hammer for £115,875 ($185,300), making it the third highest bid of the auction. The chromogenic lenticular image in light-box is numbered 1 by the artist. Chris explains his extraordinary art work, “There’s a spirit in Kate that seems to have struck a chord with so many. To take her beauty and translate it into light as image was what I set out to do. Given all the images that have ever been made if her, I needed to take it beyond beauty and somewhere deeper. Her true beauty is within and that’s what I hope is projected in the form of light.”
In all, 48 items were sold and the auction made over £1.6 million (about $2.6 million). To Christie’s delight, the sale provided an exceptional testament to fashion photography as well as to the greatest icon of style of the modern age.
