“Christie’s is auctioning Richard Neutra’s Kaufmann Desert House as a work of art, hoping to redefine what was recently considered a derelict building ripe for demolition into a $25m aesthetic masterpiece. What’s surprising is that anyone should doubt this. The house is an extraordinary achievement from the golden age of American modernism, by a renowned designer. Why does Christie’s have to labour the point that it is ‘art’? Why would anyone mistake it for anything else?”