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News Article
Robust meteorite market
NEW YORK – Darryl Pitt is often given to meteoric hyperbole.

"The meteorite market is unbelievably robust," the curator of the celebrated Macovich Collection, the world’s largest collection of aesthetic meteorites in the world, says. "The market is absolutely there, bigger and stronger than ever … We’ve finally penetrated with our works into the art buying community."

Despite his tendency for hyperbole, there are times when Pitt’s unbridled enthusiasm can be well warranted. A case in point is the Oct. 28 Bonham’s auction of these weird and wonderful intergalactic collectibles.

The 53-lot sale brought $750,000, with more than half the lots selling above their high estimates. The sell-through rate was 93 percent, with the average lot selling for more than $12,000.

It was the first auction ever devoted solely to meteorites.

The well-heeled bidders spanned the planet, with those in the auction room competing with bidders on the telephones from Canada, Europe, the Middle East and Australia, as well as throughout the United States. There were 75 bidders in the auction room, with the phones "just going crazy," Pitt said.

"The results were stronger than anticipated with near perfect results," Bonhams meteorite specialist Claudia Florian said after the sale.

Some of the lots originated from the United Kingdom’s Natural History Museum or the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, but the majority came from the Macovich Collection in New York, built up by Pitt and other enthusiasts whose interest in the stones is as much aesthetic as scientific.

For his part, Pitt can wax poetic on the subject of meteorites.

"They’re works of art from outer space," Pitt says. "They’re truly aesthetic objects, Georgia O’Keefe would love this work. Each one is a one-of-a-kind special piece, created millions of years ago … they contain the oldest matter known to man – stardust."

Top lot at the Bonham’s sale was the Sikhote-Alin meteorite, described as the epitome of an iron meteorite, which fell in Siberia Russia during the largest meteorite shower in human history. Estimated to sell for $55,000-70,000, the Sikhote-Alin fell into the laps of a floor-bidding couple for $122,750. It was the second highest price ever paid by a private collector for a meteorite.

All sales figures include a 20 percent buyer’s premium.

"This was just a spectacular piece," Pitt enthused. "It has a undulating groove to the top of it, and it just began to curve when the intensive heat struck it going through the atmosphere. Then, the curves began to soften when it cooled. It’s just a beautiful sculpted piece … there will never be another one like it … it’s just a gorgeous object."

A slice of a meteorite composed of gemstones – dubbed the Glorieta Mountain meteorite after its discovery in New Mexico sold for $82,750. Again, it blasted away its estimate of $15,000-18,000.

Another aesthetic meteorite, estimated to be about one percent of all "falls" by Pitt, was the celebrated Gibeon, found in Namibia, which sold for $26,888. Another aesthetic "find" was a cluster of desert glass found in Libya caused when an intensely hot asteroid struck the desert floor and instantly transformed a mass of sand into glass. Estimated to sell at between $300-500, it went to a private collector for $5,000.

Beyond the aesthetic, the Bonham’s sale also featured the "famous and bizarre." Within this category was the only known mailbox to have been hit by a meteorite. Still showing its massive dent, the gun-metal grey steel mailbox – which was struck outside a Georgia trailer park in 1984 – sold for $82,750. Spurred by heavy competition between private collectors and institutional curators, the mailbox delivered a price slightly above its estimate. A 5.5-gram slice of the meteorite that caused the damage – pried out of the ground shortly after impact – sold for $7,768.

A 23-gram slice of a meteorite which hit a car in Peekskill, NY was offered with pieces of the car, selling for $1,673. The only known meteorite involved in a fatality – a cow hit in Venezuela in 1972 – sold for $1,564.

Conspicuously lacking in bids, though, were two of the world’s most famous meteorites. A 28 pound crown piece of the 15-ton Willamette Meteorite, found in Oregon in 1902, was withdrawn from the sale after bidding ended at $300,000. It had an estimated value of $1.3 million. Pitt blamed the failure to sell the crown of the Willamette on an erroneous report in a West Coast newspaper.

"They reported that there was a pending lawsuit involving the Willamette, and there wasn’t," he said. "It was clearly a mistake, a piece of fiction. Although the paper issued a retraction, the damage was done. It just killed the auction for that piece. It was the equivalent of dumping toxic waste into the auction gallery."

Another piece, the Brenham Meteorite – the largest meteorite known with naturally-occurring gemstones – also failed to sell. It was withdrawn after it drew a top bid of $200,000, well short of the pre-sale estimate of $630,000-700,000.

"I don’t know what happened to that one," Pitt said. "I guess you expect nearly anything at an auction."

However, Pitt and Florian both maintain that Bonhams is negotiating with prospective buyers on both pieces.

"Either one could easily be a centerpiece to any collection," Pitt says. "There’s still interest."

Florian added: "We hope to conclude sales on the handful of unsold lots in the next several days."

Contact: (212) 644-9001

www.bonhams.com

Eric C. Rodenberg

11/9/2007
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