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René Magritte (1898-1967) – L’empire des lumières, 1954

This spectacular  L’empire des lumières by René Magritte which depicts a paradoxical Surrealist scene in which day and night are in simultaneous occurrence from the collection of Mica Ertegun is estimated by Christie’s at in excess of $95 million. It is billed as the most important Surrealist work ever at auction. There will be a series of auctions from the collection in New York beginning on November 19-20. The series spans a vast array of art and objects acquired over more than half a century and are part of Mrs. Ertegun’s personal collections in Manhattan, Southampton and Paris. An arbiter of style she was a renowned interior designer and co-founder of MAC II. A significant portion of proceeds is intended to benefit philanthropic initiatives. During her life, Mrs. Ertegun generously supported the Graduate Scholarship Programme in the Humanities at Oxford University, Jazz at Lincoln Center, the World Monument Fund and more. Jewellery, Design and Decorative Arts sales will be held on December 10 and 13 in New York and Paris. The sale in New York on November 19-20 will feature the finest in Surrealism, rare examples of Russian and Ukrainian Modernism, Purism, de Stijl and Color Field paintings.

Ioana Maria Banu Ertegun, known as “Mica,” was born in 1926, the only child of a prominent Romanian family. In 1948, the Communist takeover forced Mica from her native country to Switzerland; she later moved to Paris, then Canada, where she and her first husband settled and worked on their chicken farm on Lake Ontario. In 1958, Mica traveled to New York to meet with the Turkish ambassador in the hope that he could help extricate her father from Romania. There, she met her future husband, Ahmet Ertegun, co-founder of Atlantic Records. The couple married in 1961 and established their life in New York.

René Magritte (1898-1967) – La cour d’amour, 1960