Marlene Dumas, Miss January, oil on canvas, 1997. Size: 111 x 40 inches. In the collection of the Rubell family. Scheduled to be auctioned at Christie’s on May 14, 2025.
A press release from Christie’s auction house spotlights Marlene Dumas’ 1997 painting Miss January, and predicts that with an estimate of $12 – $18 million it will become the most expensive work by a living female artist when sold on Wednesday May 14th. The current record is held by Jenny Saville’s Propped (1992), which sold for $12.4 million in 2018.
Christie’s prediction has caught Gallery 98’s attention since we have an exceptionally large collection of Dumas ephemera that tracks her entire career. Will Miss January break the record? You will have to find that out yourself, since this Gallery 98 newsletter is going out on Wednesday night at just about the same time as the Christie’s auction.
(UPDATE: Miss January sold for $13.6 million and now holds the record as the most expensive work by a living female artist.)
Marlene Dumas was born in Cape Town, South Africa in 1953, moved at the age of twenty-three to the Netherlands, where she still lives and works today. While her art is singular, she can be broadly grouped with the Neo-Expressionist art movement that emerged in Europe and the US in the 1980s. For the last 45-years she has exhibited continually in all the world’s top galleries and museums. A valuable byproduct of this exhibition history is a large cache of gallery cards, brochures, posters and other promotional materials. Gallery 98 has been fortunate to have obtained a comprehensive collection of this ephemera while working with Dumas’ first gallerist and longtime friend, Paul Andriesse.
Visit our special Marlene Dumas page which includes over 50 ephemera items as well as an essay about her work.
Marlene Dumas in Conversation with Barbara Bloom,” book promotion for new Dumas monograph published by Phaidon, invitation card from Art Book (Amsterdam), 1999. Card size: 6 x 4.25 Inches — Available for Purchase
The exceptional appeal of Miss January was already evident in 1999 when a detail of the painting was used as the cover image for a Dumas monograph published by the prestigious Phaidon Press. This invitation card featuring the book’s cover was sent out by an Amsterdam bookstore for a promotional event with Dumas and artist Barbara Bloom, one of the books contributors.
Group Exhibition, Toile: Body (Re)presentations, Cover Images: Marlene Dumas, “Miss January” (1998), and Rei Kawakubo, “Woman Suit for Comme des Garcons” (1997), exhibition pamphlet, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (Rotterdam, NL) 1998. Pamphlet Size: 8.5 x 11.75 Inches — Available for Purchase
The group exhibition Body (re) presentations featured both fashion designers and painters. The pamphlet’s short bi-lingual essay notes how Miss January “blurred the distinction between the naked body and the covering garment” and how “the rules of revelation, of striptease are turned upside down.”
Marlene Dumas, The Painter (Dumas’ daughter Helena at age five), Jack Tilton Gallery, card for the exhibition “Not From Here,” 1994. Card Size: 9.25 x 5 inches — Available for Purchase
The Painter is a depiction of Dumas’ five-year-old daughter Helena with her hands covered with paint. Dumas’ art is about the human condition. She examines every phase of life from pregnancy to death and represents every race and every type of person. Her work is about both appearances and feelings.
Marlene Dumas, The Painter (1994), cover of foldout brochure for the exhibition “Marlene Dumas—The Image As Burden,” Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam), 2014. Brochure Size: 6.75 x 9.5 inches — Available for Purchase
A second version of The Painter was used as the cover image for the foldout brochure for “The Image As Burden,” a major retrospective that traveled to the Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam), Tate Modern (London) and Foundation Beyeler (Basel).
Marlene Dumas, card for the exhibition All Is Fair In Love And War, Jack Tilton/Anna Kustera Gallery (NL), 2001. Card Size: 9 x 2.5 Inches — Available for Purchase
This painting is similar to a series by Dumas inspired by the figure of Mary Magdalen. Previously, Dumas had written about painting naked bodies: “I know about the mingling of attraction and disgust human beings feel when they look at the skins of others…I am also aware of the differences between human beings and artificial images, that oil and paint, not flesh and blood run through their veins.”
Miss Interpreted (Marlene Dumas), a film by Rudolf Evenhuis and Joost Verhey, MM Produkties, Promotional Card, 1997. Card Size: 5.75 x 8.25 Inches — Available for Purchase
The 1997 documentary Miss Interpreted (Marlene Dumas) can be viewed on YouTube. Narrated by Dumas, with footage shot in South Africa and Amsterdam, the film has sequences of the the artist at work, interviews with close associates, and captures both a complex artist and her multi-layered work.
