A painting done by David Bowie bought at a small-town Ontario thrift shop for just five bucks has gone on to sell for over $100,000.
Today it was announced that the Bowie painting — originally found in South River, just south of North Bay, ON — sold at auction for a whopping $108,120 CAD. Titled D Head XLVI, the painting was part of approximately 45 works on canvas that Bowie did in the '90s titled Dead Heads (or D Heads).
As Cowley Abbott's Online Auction of International Art confirmed today, the work sold for more than 10 times the low-end estimate to a private collector in the U.S.
For a bit of comparison, the last D Head painting sold back in 2016 for $39,000.
"Our gallery was inundated with calls and interest for the Bowie painting throughout the duration of our Online Auction of International Art. It's a phenomenon we call the Hollywood Effect, when there is a famous name attached, or when there is an extraordinary set of circumstances such as rarity or human-interest story behind the artwork," said Rob Cowley, president of Cowley Abbott, in a statement.
"We've seen this effect previously with other artworks Cowley Abbott has sold, including a Maud Lewis painting that set an auction record in 2016, the same year Maudie, the biopic movie about Lewis, starring Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke was released; and with a William Kurelek painting that sold nearly three times its auction estimate for more than $40,000, that was originally gifted by the artist as a thank you for a basket of strudels."
Today it was announced that the Bowie painting — originally found in South River, just south of North Bay, ON — sold at auction for a whopping $108,120 CAD. Titled D Head XLVI, the painting was part of approximately 45 works on canvas that Bowie did in the '90s titled Dead Heads (or D Heads).
As Cowley Abbott's Online Auction of International Art confirmed today, the work sold for more than 10 times the low-end estimate to a private collector in the U.S.
For a bit of comparison, the last D Head painting sold back in 2016 for $39,000.
"Our gallery was inundated with calls and interest for the Bowie painting throughout the duration of our Online Auction of International Art. It's a phenomenon we call the Hollywood Effect, when there is a famous name attached, or when there is an extraordinary set of circumstances such as rarity or human-interest story behind the artwork," said Rob Cowley, president of Cowley Abbott, in a statement.
"We've seen this effect previously with other artworks Cowley Abbott has sold, including a Maud Lewis painting that set an auction record in 2016, the same year Maudie, the biopic movie about Lewis, starring Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke was released; and with a William Kurelek painting that sold nearly three times its auction estimate for more than $40,000, that was originally gifted by the artist as a thank you for a basket of strudels."
