Phillips Hong Kong Puts Three Career-Defining Works at the Center of Its Modern & Contemporary Art Evening Sale
Summary
Phillips’ Hong Kong Evening Sale brings together 20 modern and contemporary art lots.Gerhard Richter, Zeng Fanzhi and Zao Wou-Ki headline the auction.The sale takes place on today at Phillips’ West Kowloon headquarters.
Phillips is bringing together a special selection of modern and contemporary art for its Hong Kong Evening Sale today with 20 lots spanning influential artists across generations and geographies. Held at the auction house’s Asia headquarters in West Kowloon, the sale is led by works from Gerhard Richter, Zao Wou-Ki and Zeng Fanzhi, each representing a formative moment within the artist’s practice. The broader lineup also includes names such as Hajime Sorayama, Lauren Quin, Natee Utarit, Yayoi Kusama and Issy Wood, with Phillips emphasizing rarity, provenance and art-historical significance across the offering.
At the forefront is Gerhard Richter’s "Abstraktes Bild (522-1)" from 1983, estimated at $18 million - $25 million HKD (approx. $2.31 million - $3.21 million USD). Created during Richter’s celebrated “Wild Abstracts” period and the same year he relocated from Düsseldorf to Cologne, the work captures his increasingly mature use of the squeegee, layering vivid passages of color through a process that deliberately balances control and chance. Its provenance further distinguishes the painting: it was acquired directly from Richter by curator Kasper König and later included in the landmark Gerhard Richter. Bilder 1962–1985 retrospective, which travelled through major European institutions.
Two significant Asian works further reinforce the sale’s focus on pivotal transitions. Zeng Fanzhi’s "Mask Series No. 4" from 1994, estimated at $11 million - $16 million HKD (approx. $1.41 million - $2.05 million USD), dates to the inaugural year of his now-iconic Mask series and features an unusually rare double-seated composition. Produced shortly after Zeng moved from Wuhan to Beijing, the painting uses its masked figures to reflect tensions around identity, conformity and urban transformation in 1990s China.
Zao Wou-Ki’s "Sans titre (La Théière)" from 1951, meanwhile, is estimated at 10million-15 million HKD (approx. $1.28 million - $1.92 million USD) and captures the artist at another crucial turning point: following his encounter with Paul Klee, recognizable still-life forms begin to dissolve into the calligraphic gestures, spatial freedom and cross-cultural abstraction that would define his mature work.
Phillips’ Modern & Contemporary Art Evening Sale takes place at 4:30 p.m. HKT on September 30, with public viewing running through the same day at its West Kowloon galleries.
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