Femme Assise Pres d’une Fenetre (Woman Sitting Near a Window), one of Picasso’s portraits of his mistress, Marie-Therese Walter, has been sold for £28.6 million ($45.7 million) at Sotheby’s.
Picasso’s 1932 piece was the centrepiece of Tuesday night’s auction.
Helena Newman from Sotheby’s said: “This portrait is a striking and notably modern-looking work from one of the artist’s most celebrated periods.”
In total, the impressionist and modern art sale raised £121 million ($194 million).
It was the second-highest haul for a Sotheby’s evening sale in that category in London, with 18 lots selling for more than £1 million ($1.6 million).
Another highlight saw three pieces by Austrian artist Egon Schiele Liebespaar fetch a combined total of £14 million ($22.4 million).
His 1914 Selbstdarstellung mit Wally (Lovers – Self Portrait with Wally) was sold for £7.9 million, a record price for a work on paper, while Self Portrait in Green Shirt with Eyes Closed went for £5.1 million.
Woman Sitting Near a Window, one of Picasso’s portraits of his mistress, Marie-Therese Walter, has been sold for £28.6 million at Sotheby’s
Elsewhere, Claude Monet’s water lily painting Nympheas avec reflets de hautes herbes, which dates from 1914-17, sold for £9 million and his snow scene Le Givre a Giverny realized £8.7 million – much higher than the £4-6 million estimate.
“Bidders, both new to the market as well as seasoned buyers, reacted with great enthusiasm, in particular to the selection of impressionist works that were considered to be the strongest offering in many years,” said Helena Newman.
On the Picasso sale, which saw a final bid of £25.5 million, rising to £28.6 million with the buyer’s premium, Helena Newman added: “We are delighted that this stunning and monumental portrait, which is part of the defining series that introduced his ‘golden muse’ to the public eye, fetched such a strong price.
“In recent years in particular we have witnessed the remarkable allure of Picasso’s portraits of Marie-Therese to collectors.
“La Lecture sold for £25 million – double its pre-sale estimate – in Sotheby’s February 2011 sale, and Nature Morte aux Tulipes selling in Sotheby’s November 2012 sale for £41.5 million.”
Marie-Therese Walter, who Pablo Picasso called his “golden muse”, was the artist’s mistress from 1927 to 1935. Their relationship began when he was 45 and she was just 17.
Pablo Picasso and Marie-Therese, who had a daughter, Maya Widmaier-Picasso, split when Picasso found a new mistress, Dora Maar.
Marie-Therese Walter was the focus of several portraits by the post-impressionist, including the 1932 work La Reve (The Dream).
[youtube XuX1M-qy7LM]
British Culture Minister Ed Vaizey has placed a temporary export bar on Picasso’s Child With A Dove, in the hope that money can be raised to buy back the painting.
The export bar – which will remain in place until December – offers a last chance to keep the painting in the UK.
The work, which has been on public display in Britain since the 1970s, was sold privately earlier this year to an unknown foreign buyer.
It was believed to have been valued at around £50 million ($79 million).
The picture was sold by Christies auction house on behalf of the Aberconway family in Wales, who have owned the painting since 1947.
British Culture Minister Ed Vaizey has placed a temporary export bar on Picasso's Child With A Dove, in the hope that money can be raised to buy back the painting
One of Picasso’s early works – painted when he was around 19 – it is currently on loan to the National Galleries of Scotland.
Ed Vaizey’s ruling follows a recommendation by the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest, administered by Arts Council England.
The Committee recommended that the export decision be deferred on the grounds that the painting was closely tied to the UK’s history and national life.
It is also considered to be of outstanding aesthetic importance and highly pertinent to the study of Picasso’s early works and his artistic development.
The Committee ruled that it fulfils all three of the Waverley Criteria required to justify an export bar.
“Child with a Dove is a much-loved painting whose iconic status; together with its long history in British collections… make it of outstanding importance to our national heritage,” said committee member, Aidan Weston-Lewis.
It is hoped British cultural institutions may collectively be able to raise the funds to prevent its sale and export elsewhere, and keep it within the public domain.
Picasso painted the portrait of a young child clutching a dove and standing next to a multi-colored ball in Paris in 1901.
The painting, acquired in 1924 by RA Workman, is one of the earliest and most important works by Picasso to enter a British collection.
It marks a transition into the artist’s celebrated Blue Period, when Picasso moved away from a broadly Impressionistic style to a more sparing aesthetic, creating sombre works painted almost solely in shades of blue and blue-green.
RA Workman later passed it on to the prominent art collector Samuel Courtauld, who bequeathed it to Lady Aberconway in 1947.
In the 1970s, the painting was loaned out to the National Gallery in London and last year it went on display at the Courtauld Gallery.
Any decision on the export licence application will be deferred until 16 December 2012, with scope for a further deferral to 16 June 2013 should a serious intention to purchase the painting, at the recommended price of £50 million, be put forward.
