13 May 2015

$179.36 million!

, , ,

Picasso-Les-Femmes-dAlger

Visual News:

An anonymous buyer has just paid an astounding $179.36 million for Pablo Picasso’s 1955 painting Les femmes d’Alger (Version “O”), putting it in top position in the world of very expensive artworks. The painting last sold in 1997 for a paltry $31.9 million.

Olivier Camu, Christie’s Deputy Chairman of Impressionist and Modern Art had these insights on the paintings history:

    “Les femmes d’Alger, (Version “O”) is the culmination of a herculean project which Picasso started after Matisse’s death, in homage to his lost friend and competitor, and which over a period of two months and after nearly 100 studies on paper and 14 other paintings led to the creation of this canvas in February 1955. Picasso painted a series of 15 variations on Delacroix’s Les femmes d’Alger, designated as versions A through O. Throughout his series, Picasso references the Spanish master’s two versions of the shared subject, intermingling their elements.”

All of which shows that even the super-rich are not always financially sensible.

Is “Les femmes d’Alger” even arguably the greatest painting in the history of Western art? Not really. Is it even the greatest of all Picassos? Not really.

StumbleUpon.com
Comments

Please Leave a Comment!




Please note: Comments may be moderated. It may take a while for them to show on the page.
















Feeds
Entries (RSS)
Comments (RSS)
Feed Shark