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his May, Sotheby's Modern Evening Auction will feature highlights from The Collection of Adele & Enrico Donati, The David and Shoshanna Wingate Collection and The Collection of Sybil Shainwald, as well as exceptional sculptures and paintings from The Durand-Ruel Family Collection, the Barbier-Mueller Collection and The Latner Family Collection. These masterpieces capture the spirit of artists working in the late 19th and early 20th centuries—those who dared to challenge established norms to create a new and wholly modern vision of art. Tracing the historic throughlines and cross-continental dialogues between artists working across Impressionism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism and beyond, the Modern Evening Auction will spotlight these critical developments of the last 150 years, uniting those masterworks that define art history as we know it today.
Presenting partner:
Enrico Donati, often referred to as “the last Surrealist,” was at once an artist and trusted confidant to many of the movement’s leading figures, counting Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst and André Breton among his close friends. Alongside him was his wife Adele Donati, a designer and artist who worked across advertising and fashion. Rarely exhibited in public, their impressive collection reflects the breadth of Adele and Enrico’s close friendships and influences. It is led by one Pablo Picasso’s Arlequin (Buste), one of the artist’s most significant early Cubist portraits, created just two years after Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Alongside Arlequin (Buste) is Wassily Kandinsky’s vibrant Rote Tiefe (Red Depth), a dynamic example of the artist at the height of his Bauhaus era, as well as Yves Tanguy’s enigmatic Aux Aguets le jour.
David and Shoshanna Wingate built their collection over the course of a 67-year partnership, shaped by a shared commitment to art, family, and community. Their story began in Israel and continued in the United States, where they settled on Long Island and developed a life closely connected to New York’s cultural landscape. A formative moment came with their introduction to the dealer Edith Halpert, an encounter David later described as opening “a new vista.” Through this, they entered the world of modern art, establishing a foundation that would guide their collecting for decades. Grounded in curiosity, patience, and an instinct for what was truly worth sustained attention, their approach remained consistent throughout their lives.
The Collection of Sybil Shainwald reflects the pioneering lawyer’s deep love of art and savvy acquisitions of under-represented women artists. It encompasses a wide-ranging group of works spanning European and American modernism as well as postwar abstraction. Presented in the Modern Evening Auction is the psychologically-charged imagery of Dorothea Tanning, the surreal painted Femme-bouteille by René Magritte and a rare composition by Sophie Taeuber-Arp. Though varied in media and approach, the Collection is unified by an engagement with the female figure, explored across generations and artistic languages. To quote Sybil Shainwald, “I never thought of my art as an investment. I bought what I liked."
The works from The Latner Family Art Collection reveal the discerning eye of the collector and feature exceptional Modern works of painting and sculpture. Held in the same family collection for nearly 60 years, many of these works come to auction for the very first time.
In our Modern Evening Auction this May, we will build on the history-defining Collection of Jean & Terry de Gunzburg – Design Masters auction—which achieved a total of $96 million and shattered the record for the category with the sale of Claude Lalanne's Ensemble of Fifteen Mirrors for $33.5 million—with the presentation of further masterworks from their collection including paintings by Pablo Picasso and Paul Klee.
