An “exceedingly rare” bronze cast of Egon Schiele’s death mask sold for $24,600—more than ten times its estimated price—this week at London’s Sloane Street Auctions sale of 20th Century, Modern and Old Masters, Islamic and Asian Art and Jewelry. (All figures included the buyer’s premium and fees.)
The mask was made by Gustinus Ambrosi two days after Schiele died from the Spanish Flu epidemic in 1918. According to Artnet News. Ambrosi “made four copies of the mask: one for himself, one for Schiele’s mother, one for Arthur Roessler (an art critic who first recognized Schiele’s talent), and one for his publisher Richard Lanyi.” The auction house said it’s unclear if more copies of the plaster cast of Schiele’s face exist.
Ambrosi’s The Death Mask of Egon Schiele (1918) was one of 600 lots during the sale, which included Buddhist sculpture, Orientalist paintings, Persian rugs, art deco jewelry, avant-garde furniture, and Renaissance Madonnas.
Other top lots included a landscape by Sir Alfred Munnings, Dedham Mill Pool (ca. 1930) which took in $62,300, and an oil painting that has been attributed to Renoir, Study of a girl in a hat, which sold for $49,300.
Two works on paper by Schiele were sold at Christie’s in May during their 20th Century Evening Sale, both of which had been restituted to the heirs of the Austrian Jewish cabaret performer Fritz Grünbaum, whose art collection was allegedly seized by Nazi Germany before he was killed in the Holocaust. Schwarzes Mädchen (1911), a haunting depiction of a thin girl with dark hair, sold for $1.19 million against an estimate of $700,000 to $1 million. Stehender Akt mit Draperietuch, which had the same estimate, also sold for $1.19 million.
