LITCHFIELD, CONN. — The high-flier of Litchfield County Auctions’ May 20 auction was an oil on canvas by Zao Wou-Ki (Chinese-French), “Oiseaux Dans Les Nids,” 1951, that attained $487,500, including the buyer’s premium.

The painting opened at $95,000 and quickly overtook its $150/250,000 estimate when a phone bidder jumped it to $280,000. A total of nine phones chased the lot at the start but it soon came down to a phone battle between two phone bidders, including the jumper, who lost out to another phone.

“We got as close to half a million as you can,” said the delighted owner/auctioneer Nicholas Thorn after the sale. The consignor was very excited to find out he had a valuable painting,” he said, noting the collector brought it into the gallery with other artworks and did not know what he had. “He didn’t recognize the signature but because we had sold one about 12 years ago, it was immediately obvious what we had.”

The painting drew much pre-sale interest and the auctioneer arranged a private viewing in New York City the week before the sale.

A complete review of the auction will appear in an upcoming edition.