This year’s winter auctions in Cologne and Munich promise exciting art moments at the end of the year. As the days get shorter, exciting works of art can be discovered. Van Ham in Cologne and Ketterer Kunst as well as Karl & Faber in Munich are opening their rooms to exceptional works of art from the classical modern, post-war and contemporary periods. This season is characterized by spectacular collection liquidations, rare market appearances and impressive work cycles.
Van Ham in Cologne will kick things off with the Evening Sale on December 3, featuring works from the Classical Modernism and Post-War periods as well as contemporary works. Collectors of Classical Modernism can look forward to works by Max Pechstein, Emil Nolde and Alexej Jawlensky at the auction. Jawlensky’s “View of Murnau” from around 1908 is one of the artist’s first Murnau paintings. The artist discovered Murnau with Marianne von Werefkin in the fall of 1907 on their forays through the foothills of the Upper Bavarian Alps. Van Ham has valued the painting, which shows a view of Murnau’s houses, at 200,000 to 300,000 euros. A particularly haunting work is “Still Life with Mask and Sweater” by Felix Nussbaum, who was persecuted by the National Socialists as a Jewish artist and had therefore been in exile in Ostend, Belgium, since 1935. The still life was created in the Belgian coastal town and is difficult to interpret. But against the biographical background – Felix Nussbaum was murdered in Auschwitz in 1944 – it has an oppressive effect, especially the mask, which is that of a person of color. Collectors of the German artist Gerhard Richter will have the chance to bid for eight works by the artist at the Evening Sale, including both early and later works. A highlight of the auction is the painting “Beautiful Lady” by Andy Warhol from 1984. Warhol had already asked the lady portrayed several times to be allowed to depict her – until she finally agreed. The painting has been in the possession of the sitter since it was created and can now be offered by Van Ham fresh from the market for 300,000 to 500,000 euros.
Day sale and special collections
In July 2024, Galerie Thomas filed for insolvency – an announcement that sent the art world in Germany into turmoil. Auction house Van Ham was commissioned to auction off the insolvency estate. Over 400 works of art will now be auctioned off in several sales, as Markus Eisenbeis reports. Galerie Thomas had been an institution for classical modernism, expressionism and international contemporary art since 1964. On December 4, 17 works will be offered in a live auction. Around 400 works will be auctioned in two online auctions in December 2025 and January 2026. Highlights of the live auction include works by Wojciech Fangor, Leiko Ikemura and Walter Stöhrer. The Online Only auctions, also part of the Thomas estate, include works by Joseph Beuys, Serge Poliakoff and Tom Wesselmann – many without a limit. It is a rare opportunity to find works by these names at lower estimates. This auction impressively confirms that Van Ham has been a good address for insolvency auctions for years: the “Achenbach Art Auction” in 2016 already showed that the Cologne auction house has experience in this field.
In addition to the holdings of Galerie Thomas, impressive photographs from the collection of Anne Maria Jagfeld will also be on offer. The collector and interior designer has built up a photo collection of 900 works, 50 of which will be auctioned at Van Ham on December 4. Anne Maria Jagfeld has a keen interest in fashion and many of the photographs on offer are by fashion photographers such as Helmut Newton, Richard Avedon, Irving Penn and Horst P. Horst. A particular highlight is the photograph “Dovima with Elephants” by Richard Avedon. The model Dovima was one of the most successful models of her time and graced the covers of all major fashion magazines, including Harper’s Bazaar. The work now on offer at Van Ham was created for the August 1955 issue. It shows the model in a black evening dress with a white sash designed by Yves Saint Laurent for Dior between two elephants from the Paris Cirque d’hiver. Prints of the photo are in the Metropolitan Museum and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Van Ham estimates it at 30,000 to 50,000 euros. Other highlights of the auctions include works by Max Slevogt, Max Liebermann, Otto Dix, Serge Poliakoff and Leiko Ikemura.
Further south, the auctions will take place at Karl & Faber on December 4 and 5 and at Ketterer Kunst on December 5 and 6. Karl & Faber will be presenting two works by Wassily Kandinsky from his time at the Bauhaus. The top lot of the house is the work “Calm” from 1930 by Kandinsky. It will be offered in the Evening Sale on December 4 for 1.1 to 1.3 million. The work, which is exemplary for his time at the Bauhaus, combines colors and sounds – Kandinsky was a synesthete. The influence of the Bauhaus and the artists who worked there is also evident: he lived next door to Paul Klee in Dessau.
Collectors of works on paper will also find what they are looking for at Karl & Faber: One particularly interesting work was by Amedeo Modigliani. The drawing “Cariatide” from 1913 is estimated at 380,000 to 450,000 euros. Several works on paper by Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele will also be on offer. Paula Becker, who was not yet married to Otto Modersohn at the time, created the work “Seated Child with a Book on his Lap”. What is special about this painting from 1897/98 is that there is another depiction on the reverse: “Pond with Birch Trunks”. Paula Becker created this work on the reverse during her time in Worpswede in 1898. The work is valued at 80,000 to 100,000 euros.
All those who have focused their collecting on the second half of the 20th century will of course also find what they are looking for. An unusual work came from Andy Warhol, who created the so-called “Toy Paintings” from 1982 onwards on behalf of his friend and gallery owner Bruno Bischofberger. This series of paintings was explicitly aimed at children. It depicts wind-up tin toys from Warhol’s collection. The series comprises 128 canvases, each depicting one of the toys, including dogs, pandas, monkeys, clowns, robots or, as in the work now on offer at Karl & Faber, a parrot. In 1983, the works were exhibited at Bruno Bischofberger’s gallery in Zurich – the special highlight: the room was designed like a giant children’s room and the works were placed at children’s eye level – adults had to bend down or squat to look at them.
Ketterer Kunst also has Kandinsky on offer. The work from 1926 came from a private collection in Berlin that had been built up over four decades. The top lot of the auction was by Hermann Max Pechstein. The radical expressionist work entitled “Indian and Female Nude” was completed by Pechstein in 1910 and sold for 2 million at the auction. Andy Warhol’s rare Marylin silkscreen series, which rarely appears on the market in its complete form, also stands out. The series will be offered in the auction for an estimate of 1.5 to 2.5 million. Equally noteworthy is Robert Motherwell’s monumental “Open #184” from 1969, a major work from his pioneering “Open Series”, which is valued at 400,000 euros and impressively marks the artist’s transition to a more minimalist expression.
Overall, this year’s winter season is particularly intense: outstanding provenances, market-fresh rarities and rare collection liquidations combine to create an offer that attracts collectors from far beyond Germany – and makes the last auction weeks of the year a highlight of the art market. Anyone interested in art, market movements and the dynamics of major auctions will experience a rare interplay of tradition, rediscovery and international appeal this winter.
