First a world tour with "best of" pieces, then the big appearance in London with an auction crescendo that drags on for days: It's almost stadium rock, what Sotheby's offers from June to September, when 1500 objects from the estate of Freddie Mercury are exhibited and auctioned.
Ursula Scheer
Editor in the feuilleton.
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More than thirty years after his death, the flamboyant frontman of the band Queen has long been immortal. For his former partner and lifelong confidante Mary Austin, however, the time is apparently ripe to part with vast amounts of private items that she has inherited. She wants to close a chapter, she is quoted as saying by the auction house – and submits to auction what was in the Garden Lodge, Mercury's brick mansion in London's Kensington district: works of art and furniture, stage costumes and song manuscripts, curiosities and trinkets.
"A world of his own" is the title of the six-part auction series, which is also intended to reveal a lot about the person behind the stage persona. Sotheby's is clearing 16,000 square metres of exhibition space in London from 4 August to 5 September – Freddie Mercury's 77th birthday. A limited "Collection book" will be published to accompany it. The auctions will begin on 6 September, and online auctions will also take place.
The highlight is Freddie Mercury's crown, the plush, rhinestone replica of the St. Edwards crown with which the singer swung himself and his bandmates into show monarchs at the end of Queen concerts to the British national anthem. The estimated price for the headdress with matching cape is 60,000 to 80,000 pounds. Set at £200,000 to £300,000 is a handwritten working version of the lyrics for "We are The Champions". The Martin D-35 acoustic guitar with which Mercury is said to have composed "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" is estimated at £30,000 to £50,000.
In a salon of his estate hung James Jacques Tissot's painting "Type of Beauty" from 1880, which could fetch up to £600,000. In addition to Art Deco and Art Nouveau, Freddie Mercury was particularly fond of Japanese art: other connoisseurs of the subject could also access it. In his possession, for example, was a color woodcut by Utagawa Hiroshige, which is estimated to be worth up to 50,000 pounds. Extravagant sunglasses or Mercury's silver beard comb, on the other hand, are more likely to delight fans of the musician.
Mary Austin plans to donate part of the auction proceeds to the non-profit Mercury Phoenix Trust and the Elton John Aids Foundation. Last year, the Ukrainian singer and comedian Andriy Danylko had Freddie Mercury's Rolls-Royce auctioned off for the benefit of Ukraine aid. The hammer fell at £250,000, ten times the median estimate.