An overall Buy-In rate over 47% dampened the results of the recent Paris Photo adjacent photography sales at Ader in Paris. The top lot Peter Beard archive failed to find a buyer, so the top outcome honors dropped to a Claude Cahun portrait. Most of the positive surprises that did occur were for lower priced lots, so when the tally was finished, the Total Sale Proceeds (of roughly €770K) fell well below the low end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range for the two-day event.

The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):

Here is the breakdown (using our typical Low, Mid, and High definitions):

The top lot by High estimate was lot 188, Peter Beard, The End of the Game (book, notes, prints, archive from Nicolas Drucot), c1960-1990, estimated at €50000-70000; it did not sell. The top outcome of the sale was lot 119, Claude Cahun, Théâtre de recherches dramatiques, Claude Cahun and Solange Roussot in Le Mystère d’Adam, 1929, estimated at €20000-30000, sold at €41600 (image above, via Ader).

98.12% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above the estimate range and there were a total of 18 positive surprises in the sales (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate)(images above, via Ader):

Lot 14, Luigi Crette, Nice and its surroundings (15 prints), c1858-1860, estimated at €800-1200, sold at €2600

Lot 29, Unidentified photographer, Album Italy. Austria. Germany. Switzerland (55 prints), 1865-1870, estimated at €1000-1500, sold at €4160

Lot 40, John Beasley Greene, View of the Island of Béghé, Egypt, 1853-1854, estimated at €1800-2500, sold at €9100

Lot 50, Martín Chambi, Peru. Andes (89 prints), c1920-1950, estimated at €1000-1500, sold at €4550

Lot 64, Eugène Atget, Sculptures in the garden of the Château de Versailles (5 prints), c1900-1920, estimated at €800-1200, sold at €4160

Lot 65, Eugène Atget, Bacchante by Jean Dedieu. Garden of the Château de Versailles, c1920, estimated at €800-1200, sold at €3640

Lot 84, David L. De Harport, United States (4 prints), 1945-1951, estimated at €300-400, sold at €910

Lot 100, James Van Der Zee, Miss Suzie Porter. Harlem, 1915/1974, estimated at €1000-1500, sold at €4550

Lot 101, Atelier Stone (Cami and Sasha Stone), Set designed by Traugott Müller for Tolstoy’s play Rasputin, directed by Erwin Piscator. Berlin, 1927, estimated at €500-700, sold at €2600

Lot 102, Germaine Krull, Berthe Krull. Berlin, 1923, estimated at €700-900, sold at €2600

Lot 216, Inge Morath, Saul Steinberg with masks. Mannhatan, 1959/1975, estimated at €500-700, sold at €1820

Lot 230, Edward Curtis, Cañon de Chelly. Navaho, 1904, estimated at €3000-4000, sold at €8060

Lot 248, Patrick Faigenbaum, Sforza Cesarini family. Rome, 1986/1987, estimated at €1500-2000, sold at €4940

Lot 265, Horst P. Horst, Fashion for Vogue. Paris (2 prints), 1938, estimated at €1000-1500, sold at €3900

Lot 273, Helmut Newton, Eva Herzigova with Robert Beaulieu swimsuit. Monte Carlo, 1997, estimated at €600-800, sold at €2860

Lot 378, Hiroshi Sugimoto, U. A. Walker. New York, 1978/2000, estimated at €1000-1500, sold at €4160

Lot 408, Alexey Titarenko, St. Petersburg, 1996, estimated at €400-600, sold at €1560

Lot 418, Arnulf Rainer, Fehlfotografie #4, #6, #15, #19, #32, #38 (6 prints), 2005, estimated at €3000-4000, sold at €12340

Complete lot by lot results can be found here and here.