Another great Australian corporate art collection has come to an end. The last parcel of superannuation fund Cbus’s collection was dispersed by Deutscher and Hackett last week, in the final of five auctions this year. The collection of 310-artworks featuring headline artists including Arthur Streeton, Sidney Nolan, and Fred Williams, exceeded expectations and pulled in a total of $11.4 million (including buyers’ fees).
That’s a solid return for Cbus’s initial investment of $2 million in 1990 – about $4 million in today’s figures – and confirmation for the super fund that it was the right time to sell.
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Gabriella Coslovich is an arts journalist with more than 20 years’ experience, including 15 at The Age, where she was a senior arts writer. Her book, Whiteley on Trial, on Australia’s most audacious of alleged art fraud, won a Walkley in 2018.
