They closed the door behind Freddie Mercury

More than 1.4 thousand items from the estate of Queen frontman Freddie Mercury are being sold in London at six auction sessions – from September 6 to 13. Sotheby’s London received the right to sell from the heiress of the King of Pop, Mary Austin, who, after the death of her friend in 1991, was the custodian of his most famous house, Garden Lodge in Kensington. A portion of the proceeds will be donated to the Mercury Phoenix Trust and the Elton John Foundation, which supports HIV/AIDS initiatives.

Everyone predicted that Sotheby’s September session of Freddie Mercury’s belongings would be a bomb. “The King” was an avid collector, and by the time of his death at 45, he had amassed remarkable items in his beloved London home. At the same time, his collection is not faceless, was not bought for the sake of a win-win investment by skillful dealers, but is extremely individual in nature, reflecting both the bad (many things are tacky, kitschy, funny, brutal) and good tastes of the owner.

Painting and graphics, furniture and glass, sculptures and jewelry. Mercury loved art deco: from here there are quite a few Tiffany and Erte in the collection. He was a fan of Japan and Japanese art (prints by Hiroshige, Utamaro, Kunisada, dozens of kimonos, collectible porcelain). I adored “Chinese” – a lot of items from Garden Lodge were made in the chinoiserie style, from the piano to the mirror frame.

The works of art from Mercury’s collection alone would be enough for an event in the world of auctions. And adding to them a huge list of stage and personal costumes, documents, manuscripts, musical instruments, sheet music, a collection of cats of all kinds and stripes (from posters to porcelain figurines from Chinese store windows), Mary Austin and Sotheby’s created a delightful auction show for six evenings.

The very first day exceeded the wildest expectations: the auction house hoped to sell 59 lots worth from £4.8 million to £7.2 million, and collected £12.2 million. There was reason to have fun and sing: the auction on September 6 ended with the performance of a song “We Will Rock You,” the tune of which Sotheby’s employees tapped their hands on the tables and the audience sang along. It wasn’t so much “serious” art that caused a stir (a salon portrait of a woman by James Tissot did not even surpass the estimate: with the expected £400–600 thousand, the painting went for £482.6 thousand, Miró’s etching “Matador” rose from £15–20 thousand . to £88.9 thousand, and only Hiroshige’s woodcuts noticeably increased in price from £30–50 thousand to £292.1 thousand), as well as things on which the owner’s personality left the greatest imprint.

What was the reason for this – whether it was the fashion for geniuses, admiration for glory, or maybe even the belief in the transmigration of souls through things – we do not know, but it is a remarkable fact. Paying £127 thousand for the famous Adidas sneakers that Mercury wore in the 1980s (with an estimate of £3-5 thousand) is already a strong gesture. Further – more: a rainbow jacket made of satin “feathers”, which the singer wore at the concerts of the Hot Space tour in 1982, went for £203.2 thousand; a silver snake bracelet he wore on the set of the Bohemian Rhapsody video sold for £550,000; top and satin trousers, which the singer wore during a photo shoot for the cover of the band’s second album, Queen II, for £50.8 thousand; and the crown and cape that Mercury wore during the Queen’s Magic tour in 1986 were bought on the spot for £0.5 million to much applause.

The story of this evening’s high-profile sales was not limited to costumes and accessories that were close to the star’s body. Fifteen pages of a draft text for the same “Bohemian Rhapsody” (circa 1974), which in this version was first called “Mongolian Rhapsody,” were sold for £1.379 million. The most expensive lot of the first day was the Yamaha piano, behind which Mercury wrote in including “Don’t Stop Me Now”, “Somebody to Love” and “Bohemian Rhapsody”. The instrument almost reached the estimate of £2–3 million, but still earned £1.742 million. A complete surprise was the exceeding of the estimate by more than 20 times in the case of a Wurlitzer jukebox (Peacock model, circa 1941), purchased by Mercury for his kitchen: it was bought for £406.4 thousand.

The most symbolic lot was the front door of the Garden Lodge mansion: Freddie Mercury did not appear in public for the last year of his life; on November 23, 1991, he made a statement about his fatal diagnosis, and the next day he died. The green door of his house became a symbol of this transition, and for many years Queen fans left inscriptions and drawings on it and around it in honor of their idol. The door sold for £412.75 thousand, which far exceeded the preliminary estimate of £15-25 thousand. Memory also has its price.

Kira Dolinina