Haute Event: the Mimi Foundation Gala Raises £1,350,000

Last night in London, the Mimi Foundation Auction hosted a special gala in coordination with Frieze week. The gala raised £1,350,000 for the cancer charity founded by influential collector Myriam Ullens thanks to the sale of 8 star lots donated by some of the world’s most influential contemporary artists.

Simon de Pury, a long-time friend of the Ullens’, conducted the auction which saw each of the works reaching great numbers. The first lot of the night, a gold piece of jewellery by Ugo Rondinone kicked off the sale, tripling its original estimate. A major work by Sterling Ruby sold for £185,000 after a bidding war and Tracey Emin’s neon The Kiss was Beautiful more than doubled its estimate to sell for £122,500.

The highest price of the evening was garnered for Yan Pei-Ming’s Portrait of HRH The Prince of Wales, the first ever portrait of The Prince of Wales by a Chinese artist. The portrait sold for £302,500. The costs raised will be split between The Mimi Foundation and The Prince’s Drawing School.

The winning bidders on each artwork will also get to attend a private dinner at Windsor Castle with Prince Charles.

Guests included artists Tracey Emin and Marc Quinn, as well as Prince Pierre d’Arenberg, Sheikha Hoor Al-Qasimi, Nicolai Frahm, Xavier Hufkens, Bruno Wang, Jimmy Lahoud, designer John Pawson, and Phil Tinari, Director of the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing.

Photo credit: Nick Harvey/Getty.