Christie's evening sale of the Piet and Ida Sanders collection (April 16) was led by Lucio Fontana's Concetto Spaziale - a large, holey canvas executed by the Italian artist in 1954.
The piece brought €1.3m ($1.7m) to the Amsterdam auction - a 110.3% increase on its €600,000 top estimate.
 Lucio Fontana's 1954 Concetto Spaziale was always expected to lead the sale - it sold with an impressive increase on estimate |
Fontana's brick-red work emanates from his critically acclaimed "stones" series. Fontana once explained: "When I began using stones, I wanted to see if I could move forward… I thought that with the stones, the light would flow better - that it would create more the effect of movement."
An abstract sculpture by Italian sculptor Mario Marini came out second top lot. A symbolic representation of horse and rider, 1953's Cavaliere sold for €493,500 ($647,192).
Piet and Ida Sanders were married for more than 70 years, during which time they amassed an extraordinary collection of modern and contemporary art and ethnographics.
Piet, who died in 2012 aged 100, was a university professor who played a unique role in the development of international commercial arbitration. Ida died in 2010. She was an avid collector who enjoyed art as part of her daily life - another Mario Marini sculpture, Atomico, was displayed on the couple's kitchen windowsill.
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