Wingate Collection valued at $53M heads to Sotheby's auction

The Wingate Collection, amassed by David and Shoshanna Wingate over 70 years, will be auctioned by Sotheby's in New York and London on May 19 and 20. The collection comprises over 50 modern and contemporary works, including pieces by Alberto Giacometti, Wassily Kandinsky, Roy Lichtenstein, Mark Rothko, and Varvara Stepanova. The total estimate ranges from $37 million to $53 million. The highlight is Giacometti's 'La Clairière (Composition avec neuf figures)', conceived in 1950 and cast in 1960, estimated at $18 million to $25 million. Other examples of this edition are held at Kunstmuseum Winterthur and Fondation Maeght. A Rothko untitled work on paper mounted on canvas, purchased by the Wingates in 1976 at Sotheby's Parke Bernet in London, is estimated at $5 million to $7 million. David Wingate, an Israeli-born president of Hi-Shear Industries, initially resisted Pop Art but was persuaded by his son Ealan Wingate, who served as the first director of Ileana Sonnabend's gallery in SoHo in 1971 and later as a director at Gagosian for 35 years. The collection was displayed in the family's home in Old Westbury, New York, where works by Giacometti and Picasso coexisted with Tiffany pieces and works by Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland.