Bowie Self-Portrait With Handprints Heads to Sotheby's — SkimNews
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- David Bowie's 1996 self-portrait — with his actual handprints pressed onto the paper — goes under the hammer at Sotheby's on Oct. 15 as part of the Modern British and Irish Art Day Auction, estimated at £35,000-55,000 ($46,000-72,500)
- The painting emphasizes Bowie's signature anisocoria (uneven pupil size) and was one of eight self-portraits from a prolific painting period, all of which sold immediately upon release
- Bowie personally gifted the work to his St. Ives gallerist, and Sotheby's notes the unusually 'direct and personal' nature of a self-portrait bearing his literal handprints; it is now on public view and hitting the open market for the first time
- Sotheby's director Jen Hardie framed the sale as a decade-later follow-up to the house's 2016 'Bowie/Collector' auction, which sold more than 350 works from Bowie's private collection for £32.9 million ($43.4 million) and set 59 artist records
- Bowie's own art was shaped by his admiration for German Expressionism — dating to his Berlin years in the '70s — and for School of London painters Leon Kossoff and Frank Auerbach, influences visible in his self-portraits
Why it matters: For serious buyers, this is the first market appearance of a Bowie self-portrait with his literal handprints on the work, and the £35,000-55,000 estimate sits well below the blockbuster £32.9 million the 2016 sale of his private collection generated — a niche collector item rather than a headline-grabber.
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