Warhol’s “Marilyn” portrait costs $195 million

Andy Warhol “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn”

For the 1964 portrait of actress Marilyn Monroe, Christie’s achieved a record price of 195 million dollars.

(Photo: Ted Shaffrey/AP/dpa)

Dusseldorf/New York The radiantly beautiful portrait “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn” by Andy Warhol made art market history. Christie’s auctioned the 1964 painting Monday night for $195 million. This makes the portrait the most expensive work of the 20th century that has ever been auctioned.

The battle for this trophy started when the bid was $110 million. At least three bidders and the major gallery owner Larry Gagosian kept up with the ten million steps. Up to 170 million. After that, auctioneer Jussi Pylkkänen couldn’t find an art lover who was willing to give 5 million more.

Larry Gagosian, who has to pay 195 million gross, was awarded the contract. The unpublished estimate was $200 million. Only Leonardo’s Salvator Mundi, which Christie’s marketed five years ago for $450 million, was more expensive.

This record price is due to a whole range of circumstances. They make the image of the sex symbol unique and attracted super-rich art lovers from all over the world. The 102 x 102 cm screen print not only represents the most popular motif by America’s most important artist of the 20th century.

Top jobs of the day

Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.

“It’s the absolute pinnacle of American pop art and the promise of the American dream, which combines optimism, fragility and celebrity,” enthuses Alex Rotter, Christie’s director of 20th and 21st century art. Rotter places the screen print alongside Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus and Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa.

Shots in the studio

Andy Warhol had many “Marilyn” variants printed in his Factory from 1962 onwards in the same year by the tragically deceased film diva. But the sage-bluish version is something special. In the fall of 1964, the performance artist Dorothy Podber visited Warhol’s studio in New York, the Factory She asked Warhol to experience “to shoot the Marilyns”.

The pop artist agreed because he was thinking of a photo shoot. Mistake! Dorothy Podber pulled out a revolver and riddled five Marilyn portraits. You can no longer see the hole in the canvas. Since then, however, the pictures have had the word “Shot” in the title.

“Shot Sage Blue Marilyn” comes from a leading gallery for 20th century art, Galerie Thomas Ammann in Zurich. Zurich gallery legend Doris Ammann died in spring 2021 at the age of 76. The art world did not find out about this from Galerie Ammann, which was always concerned about discretion. It was the now victorious American gallery owner Larry Gagosian who broke the news in a touchingly personal obituary.

The main work and dozens of other works of art from the private collection of the estate administrator and President of the Thomas and Doris Ammann Foundation, Georg Frei, have been delivered. The art historian had managed Galerie Thomas Ammann for decades with Thomas’ sister Doris Ammann – after the sudden death of the gallery founder in 1993.

Prominent previous owners

The history of origin reads like a “Who’s Who” of market makers. “Shot Sage Blue Marilyn” had passed through the hands of collectors and gallery owners such as Leon Kraushar, Leo Castelli and Fred Mueller. It was then acquired by discerning art collector, Vogue publisher and Condé Nast owner Samuel Irving Newhouse Junior. It ended up in the private collection of the gallery founder around 1982/83 from the art dealer Thomas Ammann Fine Art.

The total proceeds from the first of two Ammann auctions are $318 million for 36 artworks. Together with the proceeds from next Friday’s day auction, 100 percent of it goes to foundations that take care of the well-being of disadvantaged children with health and education programs. The siblings Thomas and Doris Ammann were both childless.

You can read a detailed follow-up report on this week’s important auctions from Friday, May 13 on handelsblatt.com.

More: Inflation, new wealth and status thinking boost the art market

source site-17