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Record price for Irma Stern at Strauss & Co sale affirms South Africa’s status as the best marketplace to trade artworks by premium South African modernists

29 Mar 2023

• Irma Stern’s Children Reading the Koran (1939) sells for R22.3 million/ $1.227 million, a new African auction record for an artwork sold on the African continent
• 110-lot evening sale of modern and contemporary art earns R70 455 935/ $3 872 400 
• Robust demand for key South African modernists, notably Freida Lock, Hugo Naudé, J. H. Pierneef, Alexis Preller, Irma Stern, Vladimir Tretchikoff and Pieter Wenning
• Solid results for works from Naspers Collection marks turnaround in market for Hugo Naudé
• Record price for contemporary painter Ruby Swinney and excellent results for David Goldblatt, William Kentridge, Dylan Lewis and Sethembile Msezane
• World record for Vladimir Tretchikoff still life

New African Auction Record for Irma Stern’s Children Reading the Koran

Strauss & Co confirmed its status as Africa’s leading auction house when it sold celebrated modernist painter Irma Stern’s devotional scene, Children Reading the Koran, from her 1939 artist trip to Zanzibar, for R22.3 million ($1.227 million) to a bidder in the room at its premier evening sale of modern and contemporary art last night in Cape Town. The price established a new African record for an artwork by any artist sold at auction on the continent.

Irma Stern, Children Reading the Koran

“It is an outstanding price for an African modernist at auction and underscores Strauss & Co’s place as a custodian of value for important modernists like Irma Stern,” says Frank Kilbourn, Chairperson, Strauss & Co. “The quality of our offering resulted in one of the strongest sales we have seen in some time. There was strong demand throughout the auction for revered South African painters, with especially competitive bidding for important works by Freida Lock, Hugo Naudé, J. H. Pierneef, Alexis Preller, Vladimir Tretchikoff and Pieter Wenning. There can be no doubt that South Africa remains the best marketplace to trade artworks by the country’s premium modernists.”

Bidding was especially firm for works by J. H. Pierneef, confirming sustained demand following Strauss & Co’s highly successful single-artist auctions for Pierneef in 2021 and 2022. The best performing Pierneef was Highveld Landscape from 1945, which sold for just over R8 million ($440 208). This iconic work drew 26 bids and saw five prospective buyers vie to place the winning bid. Also from the Naspers Collection, Pierneef’s Red Kloof from 1928 sold for R5.5 million ($301 933). Alexis Preller’s The Red Blanket, a celebrated 1955 portrait of a woman in traditional dress, sold for R6.9 million ($377 691).

In 2011, Strauss & Co sold Irma Stern’s Two Arabs, also linked to her 1939 Zanzibar trip, for R21.2 million, a record price now surpassed by the sale of Stern’s Children Reading the Koran for R22.3 million.