Robert Indiana’s estate is auctioning $4 million in art to cover mounting legal fees

ARTNET NEWS
By Henri Neuendorf

Robert Indiana's The Great American Love (Love Wall). Photo: TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images.

Robert Indiana’s estate is selling two works from the late artist’s collection to fund its ongoing litigation. The works, by Ed Ruscha and Ellsworth Kelly, could fetch a combined sum of more than $4 million when they hit the auction block at Christie’s post-war and contemporary day sale on November 16. The executor of Indiana’s estate, James W. Brannan, a lawyer in Maine, said the estate urgently needs money to cover mounting legal fees so it can continue to defend itself against a lawsuit filed in a Manhattan court. “Litigation is expensive, especially in New York,” Brannan said. The Ruscha work, Ruby, is estimated at $2 million-3 million, while Kelly’s Orange Blue is expected to fetch $900,000-1.2 million. [More]