Why Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s art collection is expected to raise $1 billion

Paul Allen started collecting art in the early 1990s and personally selected all the works that span over 500 years of art history.

Three Studies for a Self-Portrait (1979) by Francis Bacon, estimated to fetch $25 million. (Photo via youtube.com/Christies)

Expected to raise at least $1 billion, 150 masterpieces from the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s art collection that includes a Van Gogh and Gustav Klimt, will come under the hammer at a Christie’s sale on November 9 and 10 at the Rockefeller Centre in New York.

If estimates prove correct, the auction will be exceeding the record set in May 2022 by the $922 million Macklowe collection as the largest sale in auction history. Allen’s lots span over 500 years and count among them significant works of artists such as Paul Cezanne, David Hockney, Georges Seurat and Jasper Johns. We look at the significance of the auction, how it got its value and how Allen built it over the years.

Who was Paul Allen?

Co-founder of Microsoft Corp, with fellow billionaire Bill Gates, Allen stepped down from a full-time position in the company (though he remained on the board) in 1983 as he was grappling with Hodgkin’s lymphoma, which eventually led to his demise in 2018. Ranked the 44th-wealthiest person in the world by Forbes in 2018, he met Gates at the Lakeside School in Seattle, where the two reportedly worked on computer programs in the school’s lab. The two eventually founded Microsoft in 1975.

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Also the founder of the Allen Institute for Brain Science and the Institute for Cell Science, in 1997 he bought the Seattle Seahawks, a National Football League team. Known to be philanthropic, in 2010 he signed the Giving Pledge, donating a significant part of his wealth to charitable initiatives, including those focussing on wildlife conservation and brain-cancer research. As directed by Allen, all proceeds from the art auction too would be donated to charity.

How the valuable art collection was built

Allen started collecting art in the early 1990s and personally selected all the works, not depending on an art advisor as is the case with most wealthy collectors. He often acquired directly from artists — including Jasper Johns and Georgia O’Keeffe — and private collectors, and bid on the phone during auctions. Spanning over 500 years of art history, his collection has numerous masterpieces that were often anonymously loaned to museums and touring exhibitions. Anything from this collection was rarely sold.

The art aficionado also opened Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture in 2000 and founded the Seattle Art Fair.

Some of the highlights from the sale

The 150 lots on auction are only a selection, with several of the works from Allen’s entire collection still to be revealed. The top lot is expected to be Cezanne’s La Montagne Sainte-Victoire, bought by Allen at an auction in 2001. Its presale estimate for the upcoming auction is $120 million. Georges Seurat’s Les Poseuses, Ensemble (Petite Version), arguably purchased by Allen from a private collection, is also expected to cross the $100 million mark.

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It is the same for Van Gogh’s Verger Avec Cyprès. Gustav Klimt’s 1903 work Birch Forest, has an estimated value of $90 million. The auction also reflects Allen’s particular attraction for paintings of Venice, with eight lots depicting the city, including an Édouard Manet that has a presale estimate of $65 million.

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