All artworks included in the Darius Vâlcov Collection were successfully sold at the auction organized by the Artmark auction house on Tuesday, February 17, in Bucharest.
The event lasted nearly three hours and presented the public with 34 works, namely oil paintings, watercolors, gouaches, serigraphs, and drawings, an important ensemble of works with museum value. Many were signed by canonical and internationally recognized artists.
Darius Vâlcov, former Social Democrat finance minister and mayor of Slatina, was extradited from Italy in 2023 and jailed for influence peddling and money laundering. The sale of artworks in his collection was initiated by ANAF Craiova to recover the damages established by a final criminal ruling.
Before their sale, the paintings were displayed both at the Artmark Galleries headquarters (January 16–February 17) and in a traveling exhibition in Craiova (February 5–6).
“The pieces were carefully selected, and they are very good. Although we are now in the month dedicated to our national sculptor Constantin Brâncuși, obviously Nicolae Grigorescu remains one of the important landmarks, not only of our culture but also of our identity,” said art historian Cătălin Davidescu.
Among the most important results of the evening is a drawing by Pablo Picasso, “Bullfight Scene” (created in 1959), which was sold for EUR 28,000, far above the starting price of EUR 8,000. This is the first time a Picasso work (aside from engravings or serigraphs) has ever been offered at an art auction in Romania.
The most spectacular sales belong, as usual, to Nicolae Grigorescu, the artist who also holds the record for the highest sales on the Romanian art market. Two Grigorescu paintings, namely the “Ox Cart, Morning Road” and “Ox Cart, at Dusk,” sold at the auction for EUR 170,000 each.
In the same auction, the three small paintings by Nicolae Tonitza, namely “Portrait of Ecaterina” (1918), the gouache “Tatars in Balcic” (late 1930s), and “Landscape in France” (1920s), sold for EUR 76,000, EUR 30,000, and EUR 12,000, respectively, while the painting by Victor Brauner titled “La relation” (1952) was sold for EUR 150,000, three times its starting price.
The auction achieved a 100% sell-through rate. This is a rare performance on the local market, equivalent to what major international houses call a “White Glove” result.
The next event of Artmark Galleries is the Postwar and Contemporary Art Auction, organized on Thursday, February 19, at 6:00 PM, also at Palatul Cesianu-Racoviță and online. The auction has a Brâncuși anniversary character.
radu@romania-insider.com
(Photo source: Artmark)
