American hedge funders might be too nervous to blow millions on contemporary art at the moment, but thank God for the Russians and Arabs. Damien Hirst's auction at Sotheby's in London last night turned out to be a big success notwithstanding the Wall Street meltdown, with 54 new pieces selling for a total of $127 million. [Reuters]
If your acting career isn't going the way you had hoped, may we humbly suggest you kick start things by buying yourself a role in a summer superhero blockbuster? "But that's impossible," you're no doubt saying to yourself. "Hollywood is the quintessential meritocracy, where with nothing but hard work, talent, and some good luck thrown in, all your wildest fantasies can come true!" Well you keep telling yourself that. We'll be over here, emptying our 401k and cashing our Bar Mitzvah bonds to make sure we win this Spider-Man 4 VIP Experience eBay auction, a bounty including:
Have you ever tuned into Bravo's reality series Flipping Out—that's the show that stars psycho real estate investor Jeff Lewis—and seen his housekeeper on the show, Zoila, and said to yourself, "You know, I'd love to have a portrait of her hanging on my wall?" Well, someone apparently did because a portrait of her sold for $10,400 at a Bravo-sponsored auction on Tuesday night. [NYT]
Ebay is not just for auctioning off books related to obscure literary feuds; it's also a good place for members of the working class to hustle mementos of the humbling moments when celebrities crossed their paths and acted like jerks. One item that you just missed bidding on: a receipt from an Atlanta-area restaurant signed by Outkast rapper Andre 3000. The meal cost $46.01. Andre's tip: $0. But the receipt sold for almost $15, so the waiter came out ahead. That said, let's segue into THIS: a look back at some other fabulous celebrity-related items that appeared on eBay in the recent past:
"In my secret dreams of FSU, of what FSU would mean for me, it was of course I who slept with, or almost-slept with—that would have been fine!—the Veep's handsome daughter." Bidding for the one-of-a-kind Keith Gessen middlebrow remix book stands at $660. Let's break four figures, for the downtrodden. [Previously]
Once in a rare while, an item comes along that embodies the entire cultural zeitgeist of a particular time and place. Ladies and gentlemen of the creative underclass, we have just such an item in our hands today. And it's up for sale to YOU, the public! The players in this strange saga: Harvard-educated literary it-boy and haughty heartbreaker Keith Gessen; Gawker, sworn enemy of literary culture and pimp of kittens; and a copy of Gessen's poorly reviewed but terribly important book, All The Sad Young Literary Men, with a very special twist. Here's the entire story of how this item came to be, and how you can-and must-buy it, in order to win the culture war and house the homeless:
Looking to "own, fondle, and stick your face in a place where Heath's heinie rested for many hours"? The director's chair that departed Aussie actor Heath Ledger sat on while making Brokeback Mountain is coming up for auction. It's officially expected to fetch between $1,000 and $1,500, but as Michael Musto points out, "you can bet your ass it'll go for more." [VV]
Erstwhile art dealer Larry Salander, whose gallery imploded last winter as a result of his extremely shady business practices, continues his plummet into disgrace: now people are underpaying for the carpets his creditors seized from him! As part of the liquidation of his estate, 300 of his antique carpets went up for auction at Tepper Galleries on East 25th Street on Friday. It was a bargain-hunter's dream: A social worker from Williamsburg walked away with a lovely 7-by-8 number with brown and ivory rosettes, and most lots sold for well below the bottom limit of their presale estimate. Looking to peck at the carcass of Salander's fortune yourself? His furniture and garden statuary is being auctioned off at Stair Galleries in Hudson, New York on June 7th.
Christie's won't be offering up multi-million dollar contemporary art on June 25th. Boxer shorts and wifebeaters will be on the agenda: The auction house will be selling off outfits worn by the cast of The Sopranos as part of a charity fundraising effort for a group called the Wounded Warrior Project. Up for bid: Tony's "signature outfit," which "appeared most notably in morning sequences in the kitchen of the Soprano house, or when Tony retrieved the morning paper from the driveway in front of the Soprano home." Too casual? Perhaps a Christopher Moltisanti track suit is more your style. Or if you're stocking up for Halloween, there's always this ensemble from the Season 6 episode when Uncle Junior shoots Tony in the chest. Presumably the fake blood stains account for the significantly higher reserve price.
The nude photo of French first lady Carla Bruni in her supermodel days sold at Christie's yesterday for $91,000, which was a bit better than its estimated price of $4,000. Some connoisseurs said the photo, by a lesser-known artist, wasn't that great, but maybe they missed the naked supermodel in it. Janet Jackson's iconic Rolling Stone cover shot brought only $10,000, but her boobs were covered up in that one, so it's understandable. The nude Gisele Bundchen picture brought $193,000 (estimate: $40,000). But the highest earner of the night was Helmut Newton's "Naked and Dressed" diptych, which sold for $241,000. We bring it to you for free, after the jump—NSFW, in an artsy way.
The newsmaking Christie's auction featuring the nude photo of French first lady Carla Bruni is coming up tomorrow. But she's not the only draw! The extensive photo collection has lots of other iconic pop culture shots, including the original photo of that famous Janet Jackson Rolling Stone cover (pictured). It also includes artistic nudes of stars like Kate Moss, Lauren Hutton, and Naomi Campbell, spanning four decades. You can see the whole collection here [via UD]. After the jump, one sample: a 1999 Irving Penn portrait of supermodel and Tom Brady girlfriend Gisele Bundchen [NSFW], which can be yours for as little as $30,000:
Is NBC betting on the Writers Strike continuing indefinitely? A recent press release that might have nothing to do with anything could be construed as to suggest 'yes'! "SELECT ITEMS FROM NBC'S HOTTEST SHOWS TO BE FEATURED IN SECOND LIVE AUCTION" they announce. Starting Monday the 21st, head over to nbc.com to buy up unused "select items" from "Heroes," "The Office," "Friday Night Lights," "30 Rock" and (best of all!) "Las Vegas." Items getting auctioned listed below.
Apropos of nothing other than wanting to briefly pause from reliving the horror of last night's Golden Globes (don't worry, we'll get back to it soon enough), we'd like to direct you to this eBay auction offering some reproductions of the hilarious/disturbing paintings by artist Miguel Calderon that were memorably featured in The Royal Tenenbaums. At a starting price of $3,000, it might be cheaper to indulge your Wes Anderson fanaticism by renting some ATVs with your buddies for a fun day of shirtless, mescaline-fueled off-roading. [eBay]
We have no idea what anyone but the most psychotically obsessed Lindsay Lohan fan might want with an empty Domino's box that was delivered to her family's Long Island home while she was sneaking off to Cirque Lodge for a third try at rehab—after all, since she never touched it, one can't even reasonably hope to clone her from the DNA in an auburn hair stuck to the grease spot on its bottom. Still, for the dedicated Lohan-watcher, there might be some value in owning any part of her historic meltdown, no matter how peripheral; maybe winning the very affordable auction for the pizza box could hold someone over until he has an opportunity to blow his life savings on Lindsay's highly collectible coke-pants once they make their inevitable eBay appearance.
Perhaps the only thing more depressing than calculating that if Paris Hilton receives the $1 million NBC is reportedly paying her for their World! Exclusive! Post-Jail! Interview!, she effectively will have earned $43,478.26 for each of the 23 days she served in prison is reading about the behind-the-scenes chess match (chess is the game where one person places a stack of twenty-dollar bills on a table, and then the other player counters by dumping a Hefty bag full of hundreds on top of it, right?) that resulted in the Peacock's big "get." The NY Times reports that NBC was triumphant in the Hilton showdown because ABC, like the tragic loser in so many ethnic-joke duels, brought a knife to a gunfight:
It feels like only yesterday that Paris Hilton was re-jailed after one magical night of luxuriating in the freedom of home-imprisonment, but the moment when she finally emerges from an unjust incarceration and shines as a Mandelaesque beacon of hope to all of those affected by Los Angeles County's oppressive system of celebutardtheid is nigh. And when Hilton exits the Century Regional Detention Facility sometime next week, she will need to be greeted by a television camera and a friendly face to ease her transition into her new role as Goodwill Ambassador for Stuff She Cares About Now.
One of the events taking place during Stanford University's "Entrepreneurship Week" — already in progress! — is the Innovation Challenge. Participants have a few days to maximize value from a pad of 100 3"x3" Post-it notes. Prizes include various meetings and activities with Silicon Valley bigwigs, including a hockey game with Guy Kawasaki and "deathball" with Tim Draper. On team of playas has decided to pre-emptively auction the prize on eBay as a way to actually win said prize; the auction lot is a set of ten Post-its, each of which will be a "ticket" to hockey with Kawasaki. No bids yet (auction closes Mar-02-07 01:47:14 PST), but that's potentially a good thing, as the prize may also be won by the team who demonstrates the "most dramatic failure." If only venture capital investing had such a fallback reward.
When modest possessor of immodest investment wealth Warren Buffett discovered that his signature gold 2001 Lincoln Town Car had become infested with multi-ethnic moppets, he had no choice but to put the violated vehicle up for auction. Since it appears Ford doesn't plan to keep making the Town Car, New York's grandees of finance and media are buckling down for the change to other brands of professional chariot. The age of the venerable Black Car may be dead at last. Buffett leads the charge by giving up his gold hoopty for charitable auction. Bidding's passed $32K as of this writing, so if you want to plant your ass into the seat impression left by some of the richest buttocks in the world, act now. Note: Includes "THRIFTY" vanity license plate. Car not actually made of gold.
