One of this auction’s flagship pieces is a portrait of Mao Tse-tung. Warhol “understood that while Mao’s actual political influence was fading, he was still an ‘icon’ ready to have his reputation sanitized and transformed into a subject for a capitalist art audience”, wrote the Huffington Post. About these pieces, the New York Times wrote, “Bidders are likely to include not just the wealthy American hedge fund managers who have been spending huge sums of money on "wall power," but also China's new rich, who have also begun snapping up contemporary art. For those Chinese bidders, a historic portrait of Mao would be considered the linchpin of any collection.” Given such a breadth of potential bidders, this Warhol work will surely move quickly. Aspire’s lots also reflect a history of art that’s been diminished over time, due to possibly controversial reasons. This auction features a charcoal-on-paper work by Italian artist Mario Sironi, whose images shaped the political myths of Italian Fascism and earned the approval of Mussolini through the “PNF” (Partito Nazionale Fascista). Several of the Italian works have a collection stamp from the Casa del Fascio of Ferrara, which served as a headquarters for members of the Fascist party in the northern Italian city of Ferrara. Aspire also offers less politicized Italian works; namely, a lovely collection of fine art glass. One example is Pino Signoretto’s horsehead vase (lot 211), a luminous green glass vase designed after an archaic Roman form of a horse head poised on a circular base. The Murano-based Signoretto has worked with artists such as Dali, Vercruysse, and Koons; he’s also been shown at the Tohama School of Glass and the New York Experimental Glass Workshop.