The London summer auctions of Modern and Contemporary lacked grandeur.

Sought-after young contemporaries continued to do well, but after a series of superlatives achieved in New York in May, hardly any new records were set on the Thames.

The disappointment at Sotheby's was Ernst Ludwig Kirchner's "Self-Portrait with Pipe" from 1907, which was fresh from the market and remained unsold.

Christie's kicked things off with a compelling 20th/21st Century: London Evening Sale.

Simone Leigh, winner of the Venice Golden Lion, drew the first ticket.

Her terracotta head of a woman with raffia skirt, 'Untitled V (Anatomy of Architecture Series)' (estimate £300,000-500,000) rose to £575,000.

Monet's top lot Waterloo Bridge, effet de brume (22/32 million) and his Nymphéas, temps gris (20/30 million) were sold comfortably within their estimates to the same telephone bidder at £26 million each.

By way of comparison, in May, Monet's Le Parlement, soleil couchant set the record for a London view at Christie's in New York for $66 million.

Yves Klein's casts of naked female bodies on a blue background in "Anthropométrie de l'époque bleue (ANT 124)" stayed with 23,

5 million just below expectation.

'Ingrid with Flowers' (150,000/250,000) by hot up and coming painter Anna Weyant rose to £320,000.

In May, one of her paintings fetched a record $1.3 million in New York.

A giant format of Dana Schutz had been withdrawn.

Ukrainian mega-collector and steel entrepreneur Victor Pinchuk and his wife Olena had submitted the monumental steel sculpture "Balloon Monkey (Magenta)" (6/10 million) by Jeff Koons.

It rose to 8.6 million through the Copenhagen art collector Jens Faurschou in the hall.

The proceeds will benefit the medical care and rehabilitation of Ukrainian citizens and soldiers.

You can always rely on Magritte: his small stone apple in the painting "Souvenir de voyage" (5/7 million) rose to 13.8 million.

Ernie Barnes' 1978 Main Street Pool Hall climbed to £1.2million, ten times the top estimate.

With 55 of 61 lots on sale, Christie's grossed an impressive £180.9m.

At Sotheby's, there were almost as many visitors in the hall as before the pandemic.

First up was “British Art: The Jubilee Auction”.

John Constable's little "Cloud Study" (100,000/150,000) of 1822 shot up to £580,000 right at the start.

This was followed by Magdalene Odundo's bulbous terracotta vase "Untitled" (60,000/80,000) from 1984 at 240,000 pounds.

Things really got going when Flora Yukhnovich's contemporary rococo interpretation "Boucher's Flesh" (200,000/300,000) was called up.

One bidder jumped from £350,000 to £1m, but that didn't intimidate the competition: the hammer fell at £1.9m.

"Head of Gerda Boehm" (2/3 million), a melancholy portrait by Frank Auerbach, formerly owned by David Bowie, achieved 3.4 million - a new record.

The consignor paid £3.78 million plus premium at Sotheby's in 2016.

The top lot, Francis Bacon's market-fresh, important 'Study for Portrait of Lucian Freud' in 1964 was estimated at 'more than' £35 million.

The gavel fell at 37.5 million.

With premium, there are 43.3 million pounds.

Only large, multi-panel paintings by Bacon are more expensive.

The highlight at Sotheby's "Modern and Contemporary Evening Auction" was Gerhard Richter's sublime cloud study "Study for Clouds (Contre-jour)" (6/8 million).

Four bidders pushed the price up to 9.5 million.

Then Kirchner's “Self-Portrait with Pipe” – paler in the original than in the catalog – came up for auction without any guarantee;

neither Sotheby's nor any third party had approved one.

The estimate was eight to twelve million pounds.

Apparently, the consignors were too ambitious, which can be a reason for the lack of guarantors.

The auctioneer, Helena Newman, waited in vain for a minimum bid of six million.

Monet's summery river landscape "Vétheuil" was offered at a low estimate of ten million pounds.

"Two Poplars" (800,000/1.2 million) by Georg Baselitz, painted in 1975, went for 580.

000 pounds away.

The top lot, a "self-portrait" (12/18 million) by Andy Warhol, was brokered over the phone by David Rothschild for a bid of just eleven million.

Both auctions together fetched £149.2m with 62 lots out of 78 on offer.

A fairly high proportion remained unsold.

A year ago, the same combination of 83 tickets generated sales of 156.2 million.

At Phillips' "20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening Sale", it was mainly female artists who managed to beat the estimates.

In third place came Flora Yukhnovich with "Moi aussi je déborde" (250,000/350,000) in pastel shades with a hammer price of 1.4 million pounds through an online bid from Canada.

An online bidder from Lebanon bid on seven works and was successful twice - sometimes all it takes is a determined underbidder to boost the result of an entire auction.

In María Berrío's The Riders II collage (150,000/200,000) he was beaten out by a Hong Kong telephone bidder at £650,000.

However, Simone Leigh's portrait sculpture "Clarendon" (800,000/1.2 million) remained under the appraisal at 700,000 pounds.

An oil on velvet painting by Issy Wood, 'Not Turned On', was fetched within the estimate at £120,000.

Cy Twombly's 1962 top ticket "Untitled" (3/4 million) sold for 2.2 million in just one bid.

Michelangelo Pistoletto's guaranteed "Ragazza in minigonna / Ragazza seduta per terra" achieved its bottom estimate of 1.8 million.

With 31 works out of 33 on offer, Phillips grossed a total of £17.5m.