THE finest example of Assyrian art to come to the market in decades – a 3,000 year old relief of a winged genius from the Palace of Ashurnasirpal II – will come up at Christie’s antiquities sale in New York on October 31. The work will be sold on behalf of the Virginia Theological Seminary to underwrite a scholarship fund.
G. Max Bernheimer, International Department Head of Antiquities said: “This Assyrian relief is without question the most exquisite to come to the market in more than a generation, in terms of the style, condition and subject. The last example, sold by Christie’s London, was the Canford School relief which depicted two figures that were only preserved from the waist up, while here we have a complete figure, perfectly-preserved from head to toe. The Canford School relief set a world-record in 1994 when it sold for nearly $12 million. The Virginia Theological Seminary acquired this relief through the American missionary Dr. Henri Byron Haskell (1781-1864) in 1859, who bought it directly from Sir Austen Henry Layard, the excavator of the royal palace at Nimrud. The relief arrived in Alexandria in 1860, making it one of the earliest-known examples of ancient art to reach American soil.”
The large-scale gypsum relief is over seven feet tall. It once adorned the walls of the massive Northwest Palace commissioned by King Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 B.C.) at Nimrud in modern-day Iraq. It depicts a Winged Genius, a deity also known as an Apkallu, holding a bucket and a cone-shaped object, signifying fertility and protection for the king. The Apkallu has feathered wings and wears elaborately detailed robes, a horned headdress, an earring, a necklace and armlets, and has two daggers and a whetstone tucked into fabric folds at his waist.
UPDATE: The relief achieved a world record price of $31 million.
