NEW YORK, April 2 — The build-up was intense. Since July, when Sotheby’s struck a deal with eBay to have its auctions carried live, the marriage of the blue-blood auction house to the blue-collar online retailer had generated tingles of anticipation. But yesterday, when eBay streamed Sotheby’s auctions for the first time, the event could not have been more sedate, more like a day at the library than a cut-and-thrust bidding war over Cameoware dishes.

Sotheby’s held two auctions in its York Avenue showrooms, allowing eBay users to place bids online, in real time, along with on-site and telephone bidders and visitors to its own website, which has carried live auctions since 2010.

The first auction, which began at 10am and ran until late afternoon, was devoted to photography, with 188 lots by masters like Eugène Atget, Ansel Adams, Irving Penn, Richard Avedon. Many of the lots were estimated to sell for US$5,000 (RM18,470) to US$30,000, and most attracted some online bids, although it was impossible to tell by watching whether they came from eBay or the Sotheby’s website. The total for the sale came to US$5.17 million, according to Sotheby’s. Last year’s photography sale, with 187 lots, earned just over US$4 million.

A scheduled evening auction contained 91 lots, mostly books, prints and photographs with New York as their subject, but it also included a highly unusual offering from the collection of Reggie Jackson: the 10-foot-tall blue letters that stood atop Yankee Stadium from 1976 to 2008, spelling out the name of the ballpark. It was estimated to sell for US$300,000 to US$600,000. Gauging the impact of eBay will be difficult, at least in the short term. Sotheby’s does not release separate figures for online sales, and executives at eBay declined to provide sales figures or give the number of eBay customers taking part in the auctions. An eBay spokeswoman, Kari Ramirez, said the officials would not divulge figures because the company was preparing to release its first-quarter earnings report later this month.

Sotheby’s is hoping to bring its sales to eBay’s 155 million worldwide users, who can simply navigate to a special Sotheby’s section of the eBay website and register 24 hours in advance of the auction they are interested in. Initially, eBay will broadcast only Sotheby’s daytime auctions, where the goods tend to be less expensive. The New York-themed auction yesterday night was a one-time affair.

Sotheby’s tried a partnership with eBay once before, in 2002, but the experiment quickly fizzled after failing to generate profits. Since then, however, public acceptance of online bidding has grown. According to a report from the European Fine Art Foundation in Maastricht, the Netherlands, online sales last year accounted for nearly US$3.6 billion, or 6 per cent of global art and antiques sales of about US$55 billion, with most sales between US$1,000 and US$50,000.

That’s where eBay comes in. Josh Pullan, Sotheby’s e-commerce director, said the auction house had designed its section of the eBay website to highlight works of US$25,000 or less, in contrast to Sotheby’s own site, where top billing usually goes to the more expensive offerings.

For the photography sale, for example, Sotheby’s site singled out Nicholas Nixon’s time-lapse portrait series “The Brown Sisters,” which sold for US$370,000, including the buyer’s premium — well over its top estimate of US$300,000 — and Paul Strand’s portrait “Rebecca,” expected to sell for US$300,000 to US$500,000. “Rebecca” failed to meet its reserve and was withdrawn from sale.

The two companies said an eBay customer had bought Terry O’Neill’s 1977 photograph “Faye Dunaway at the Beverly Hills Hotel” for US$10,000. It had been highlighted on the eBay website. An eBay customer also bought a Yousuf Karsh photograph of Georgia O’Keeffe, for US$27,500.

“We’re thrilled to see eBay customers engage with the new Sotheby’s live auctions experience on eBay today, placing and winning bids on a variety of lots. It marks a great and promising start to this new endeavour,” said Megan Ford, director of emerging verticals and live auctions at eBay.

Eager to attract first-time buyers and inculcate the auction habit, Sotheby’s has sprinkled the eBay site with how-to tips; short interviews with insiders like fashion photographer Sebastian Kim, who shares thoughts about collecting in his area; and 30-second videos that tell the back story of certain works. Further tinkering is likely to take place, as the eBay experiment unfolds.

“It’s a long road,” Pullan said. “It is going to take time to build.” — New York Times