Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/12/01
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I went to the photo auction at Villa Grisebach in Berlin last Friday. This was quite an experience and on several occasions I was quite scared that I had inadvertently given off a bid by looking at the auctioneer. They had ten people taking telephone bids and a lot of agents in the auction room talking on their mobile phones in foreign languages. In the end, the only thing I bought was the large and high quality catalogue which is extremely good value at 30 Marks. (One Mark is just under 50 cents.) There were 400 lots for sale, all with a picture in the catalouge which gives a fantastic round-up of photos old and recent. There is a selection of pictures from the catalogue on http:// www.villa-grisebach.de The highest price paid was for item 1380 a portrait of Gustav Klimt by Moritz Nähr that went for over 80 thousand Marks (plus 22% commission and tax) perhaps partly because it had been signed by Klimt. There were six Cartier-Bresson prints generally selling for two-three thousand marks each. Seeing these prints proved to me that not all pictures taken by HCB are good, but that some are outright lousy. I also went to a gallery in the Kantstrasse and was quite surprised to find very good photos by Avedon that he made in 1994. After all the guy was born in 1923, so there is still hope for me and a few of you.. Knowing there are quite a few jewish LUGgers, let me tell you that I went to the new Jewish Museum (architect Libermann) which is still empty inside, but where they already now have guided tours due to the great public interest. During our tour there was a (false) fire alarm with sirens going off, doors automatically closing and almost total darkness. This added to what Libermann had intended was almost too much... Worth visiting also without the alarm going off.