Five days before a trove of 16 masterpieces from the late media magnate S.I. Newhouse is set to hit the block as part of Christie’s New York evening sales, the auction house has released a two-minute video promoting one particular sculpture in the sale.
The short film, as Christie’s refers to it, was filmed in early May and features none other than Academy Award–winning actress Nicole Kidman starring alongside Constantin Brancusi’s bronze sculpture Danaïde (1913). The sculpture, expected to be one of the top lots this season, carries a pre-sale estimate of $100 million, well above the artist’s $71.2 million record, though below the three most-expensive sculptures ever sold at auction, all by Alberto Giacometti.
According to a Christie’s spokesperson, the concept for the video was inspired by a Man Ray film of Lee Miller uncovering Brancusi’s controversial sculpture Madame X. (The film, and a marble version of the sculpture, are included in the Brancusi retrospective currently on view at the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin.)
In the Christie’s video, Kidman is on the phone as she strides into “Rock Center,” where the auction house’s headquarters are located and where works from the upcoming sales are on view before they hit the block. She tells the person on the other end to “tell them it can wait. I’m not pushing this.” Cue David Bowie’s 1975 track “Golden Years,” as Kidman confronts Danaïde on a white pedestal in an empty room enclosed by a circular wall of curtains. The click of Kidman’s heels echo in the empty room as she circumnavigates the patinaed bronze sculpture, almost in a trance. Archival black-and-white photos tracing the history of sculpture—both works that inspired Brancusi along with those influenced by him—flash on the screen before the music picks back up.
Kidman dances around the sculpture to “Golden Years” in a way that would definitely get any other visitor swiftly reprimanded. She even traces her finger, noticeably not in a white glove, which anyone coming into contact with the work would be required to wear, around the edge of the pedestal while looking at Danaïde seductively. Back on the phone, she tells her confidante that she doesn’t think she’s going to make it (where, one wonders) and that she needs “a little more time.”
She’ll have until at least May 18, when Danaïde—along with works by Picasso, Pollock, Matisse, Rothko, and other giants of modern art from the Newhouse collection—are expected to bring in some $450 million.
