A portrait of actress Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol has sold for $195 million in New York. This makes it the most expensive work of art ever auctioned off in the 20th century.
The 1964 screenprint “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn” was auctioned at Christie’s on Monday, kicking off the spring auction. The auction house describes the iconic pop art image as the “modern Mona Lisa”. The “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn” is “one of the greatest paintings of all time” and “the most important picture of the 20th century to be auctioned in this generation”, said Alex Rotter, who is responsible for art of the 20th and 21st centuries at Christie’s , said beforehand. “Andy Warhol’s Marilyn is the absolute pinnacle of American pop and the promise of the American Dream, encompassing optimism, fragility, fame and iconography all at once.”
Only the painting Salvator Mundi, originally falsely attributed to Leonardo, has fetched more than the Warhol painting at auction, which sold for $450.3 million in 2017, making it the most expensive work of art ever sold at auction. Pablo Picasso’s The Women of Algiers, which sold for $179.4 million in 2015, came second.
The bid for the $200 million Shot Sage Blue Marilyn came from New York dealer Larry Gagosian, believed to be acting on behalf of a client. The picture comes from the Thomas and Doris Ammann Foundation in Zurich, which intends to use all proceeds from the auction for charitable purposes. The Marilyn sale is just the beginning. For about two weeks, Christie’s and Sotheby’s want to tumble further records.
Christie’s raves in advance of its “best season yet.” Among other things, Sotheby’s is offering the second part of the Macklowe Collection, the first part of which set records at last year’s autumn auction – with works by Gerhard Richter, Mark Rothko, Sigmar Polke, Willem de Kooning and others.
In addition, Sotheby’s is expecting a lot from Picasso’s “Femme nue couchée” from 1932, which could fetch more than $60 million, and from a painting of Venice by the French painter Claude Monet, which is estimated at around $50 million.