$27.7 million Bacon tops New York art auction sales

The work fell short of the $30 million to $50 million range the house hadestimated for the portrait -- the first in a series of 10 the painter made ofGeorge Dyer between 1966 and 1968 -- which was making its debut at auction.
The highest price paid for a single-panel portrait by Bacon is $70.2 million,which came from the same Dyer cycle.
American painter Joan Mitchell, whose works have led a revaluation ofpaintings by women artists, was one of the stars of the evening, reports BSS.
Her work "Noon" exceeded $22.6 million, maintaining an upward trend thatbegan last November, when two pieces by the "second generation" Americanabstract expressionism artist fetched over $20 million for the first time.
Her record sale stands at $29.1 million.
The night set other records such as the $19 million paid for a work by AndyWarhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat, the highest ever paid for a collaboration ofthis kind, and the nearly $23 million for a work by Lucio Fontana, thehighest price ever paid for the Italian artist at auction.
A sculpture by Frank Stella also went for over $15 million.
Another rising star was recently deceased African-American artist FaithRinggold, whose work was sold for more than $1.5 million, three times morethan her last record.
French-Israeli Patrick Drahi's auction house will hold another evening ofmodern art sales on Wednesday, featuring works by Claude Monet, PabloPicasso, Alexander Calder, Rene Magritte and British artist LeonoraCarrington.
With sales of $14.9 billion last year, the art market dropped 14 percentcompared with 2022, although online transactions saw a 285 percent jump.
Sotheby's hopes to collect between $549 and $784 million this week in NewYork, after the good results in Europe, in a market led by American investorsand collectors, closely followed by buyers from Asia.