Inside the Market: The Demand for María Berrío’s Intricate, Mixed-Media Canvases
María Berrío, The Riders II, 2012. Courtesy of the artist and Phillips.
The Latest
María Berrío’s secondary market remains strong. Her mixed-media collage The Riders II (2012) sold at the end of June for £809,000 ($983,756) at Phillips’s 20th-century and contemporary art evening sale in London, an impressive 362% above the median estimate of £175,000 ($210,550). The Riders II is indicative of the Colombia-born, Brooklyn-based artist’s acclaimed surrealistic style that incorporates torn pieces of patterned Japanese paper, sequins, and other materials to build out her deeply layered mythological worlds. Berrío blends magical realism with biography to compose majestic narrative portraits of women. Berrío’s active secondary market is all the more impressive considering that her auction debut only came last fall. Since then, she has maintained a visible presence at the three major auction houses, exceeding auction estimates at each one.
Key Figures
- In 2019, Berrío joined the rosters of both the Los Angeles–based gallery Kohn Gallery and London-based gallery Victoria Miro, receiving solo shows at each in 2019 and 2020, respectively.
- Berrío made a dramatic auction debut in November 2021 at Sotheby’s “The Now” evening sale when her painting Flor (2013) sold for $927,500, a staggering 828% above the median estimate of $100,000.
- In February 2022, her solo booth at Frieze Los Angeles, presented by Victoria Miro, nearly sold out before the fair opened to the public.
- At Sotheby’s “Contemporary Curated” auction this March, Berrío’s collaged painting La Cena (2012) set her auction record (which still stands) when it sold for $1.5 million, more than three times its estimated high of $450,000.
- Her work continued to outperform expectations at the recent May auctions in New York: At Christie’s 21st-century evening sale, The Celebration (2011) netted $1.3 million, nearly twice its estimate high of $700,000; Burrow of the Yellow (2013) nearly doubled its estimate of $400,000–$600,000 when it sold for $998,000 at Phillips’s 20th-century and contemporary art evening sale; and The Lovers went for twice its estimated high of $500,000 when it hammered for just over $1 million at Sotheby’s “The Now” evening auction.
- Prior to her tremendous secondary-market success, Berrío received a landmark career accomplishment when she was commissioned in 2017 by New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority to produce a permanent mosaic installation, The Magic is Underneath All, at the Fort Hamilton Parkway subway station in Brooklyn.
- In 2021, Berrío became the inaugural recipient of the Joan Mitchell Fellowship awarded by the Joan Mitchell Foundation.
- Berrío’swork is included in the permanent collections of esteemed institutions like the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Yuz Museum in Shanghai.
- She is currently featured in the exhibition “Women Painting Women” at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth alongside artists Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Chantal Joffe, Alice Neel, and Paula Rego through September 25th.
The takeaway
Berrío’s secondary-market success speaks to her establishment as a leading artist of figurative painting and collage. It also indicates the continued interest in surrealistic styles, especially by women artists, further confirmed by auction sales of work by artists like Issy Wood and Anna Weyant and institutional offerings like the 59th Venice Biennale’s main exhibition, “The Milk of Dreams,” which foregrounds works by Cecilia Vicuña and Belkis Ayón, among others. The confluence of institutional validation and impressive market results is a surefire sign that Berrío is not just an emerging painter, but a leading figure of a growing artistic movement.
