Sotheby's starts auction season with $240 mln sale

NEW YORK, Nov 8 (Reuters) The fall auction season got off to a solid start at Sotheby's, which sold some 240 million dollars worth of Impressionist and modern art at one of its biggest sales in years.

The 238.67 million dollars total -- toward the low end of the 220 million dollars to 300 million dollars pre-sale estimate -- was much helped by two paintings that broke the 30 million dollars barrier: Cezanne's still life ''Fruit and Ginger Jar'' and Modigliani's ''The Concierge's Son,'' which soared far past expectations to fetch 31,096,000 dollars, or just shy of the artist's record.

While prices were strong and bidding fairly steady, the auction lacked the charge that courses through salesrooms during the most dynamic events.

Sotheby's officials nonetheless welcomed the result, saying it was its best showing since 1990.

''We're absolutely thrilled,'' said David Norman yesterday, the auction house's chairman of Impressionist and modern art. The sale signaled a ''very varied buying pool'' with a lot of international interest, he said, adding, ''There's really no segment of the market that's out of fashion.'' Besides the Modigliani, Norman cited strong prices for sculpture, as well as works by Wassily Kandinsky and some Picassos.

Kandinsky's vibrant seascape ''Starnberger See (Lake Starnberg),'' a 1908 oil, went for 9,088,000 dollars including commission, eclipsing its high estimate of 8 million dollars to become the fifth-highest priced work of the night.

Records were also set for two woman artists, Barbara Hepworth and Lynn Chadwick, whose sculptures far outpaced their estimates.

TOP LOT The evening's top lot was, as expected, the Cezanne still life, which exceeded its high estimate and sold for 36,976,00 dollars. In all, 87 per cent of the 83 works on offer found buyers, but the unsold works included some major casualties.

Among the most noteworthy was Monet's ''The Beach at Trouville,'' which brought no bids beyond 14.25 million dollars after an estimated of 16.5 million dollars to 20 million dollars.

Picasso's ''The Rescue'' also went unsold when bidding topped out at 10.75 million dollars, as did several lower-priced works by the artist, suggesting the red-hot market for Picassos of recent seasons could be ebbing just a bit.

It could also be that bidders were holding their cards close to the vest in anticipation of Christie's monumental Impressionist and modern art sale today. With a pre-sale estimate of up to 500 million dollars, it has been billed as the biggest single auction in history.

Several works by Gustav Klimt looted by the Nazis and restituted to the heirs of Ferdinand and Adele Bloch-Bauer earlier this year are being sold, including ''Adele Bloch-Bauer II,'' which could sell for more than 60 million dollars. Another Klimt portrait, ''Adele Bloch-Bauer I,'' set a record price for any work of art when it sold last summer to a New York gallery for a reported 135 million dollars.

REUTERS PB DS1210