Episode 24: A Conversation with Denise Bethel, Part I

Denise Bethel joined Swann Galleries in 1980, soon after photographs auctions were inaugurated in New York.  After a decade at Swann, she moved to Sotheby's in 1990, where she rose from senior specialist to Chairman of the Department in her 25 years there. At Sotheby's, she set records in a host of categories, among them the record for any photographs auction worldwide, at $21.3 million, in December 2014. She orchestrated the sales of no less than eight of the eleven classic photographs that have sold at auction to date for over $1 million or more, and she wielded the gavel for all of them. One of these, Edward Steichen's "The Pond, Moonlight," at $2.93 million in 2006, is still the world record for any classic photograph at auction. In this episode, Denise and I discuss the first half of her auction career at Swann Galleries, here in New York City.  She transformed what was then known as Photographica sales into Photographs auctions, impacting the way people think about buying and collecting photographs.  This is the Expert Eye.