LONDON.- This evening, Sotheby’s London Contemporary Art Evening Sale brought the extraordinary total of £108,803,550 / $174,129,201 /€120,923,897 – in excess of pre-sale expectations (estimate: £74-105 million) and establishing the highest total ever achieved for any sale of Contemporary Art in London. Buyers from 14 countries participated in the auction, which achieved remarkable sell-through rates of 89.8% by lot and 93.9% by value and established five new artist records. Twenty-nine works sold for over £1 million, and 45 lots sold for over $1 million. The Duerckheim Collection – the greatest offering of German Art of the 1960s and 1970s ever to come to market – realised £60,401,650 / $96,666,801 / €67,130,189, almost doubling the low estimate of £31.8-45.9 million, with almost every lot contested by multiple bidders. A further 25 lots from the collection will be offered in tomorrow’s Contemporary