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  • Posts Tagged ‘Magritte’

    THE MOST IMPORTANT SURREALIST WORK EVER AT AUCTION

    Monday, September 23rd, 2024

    René Magritte (1898-1967) – L’empire des lumières1954

    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

    MAGRITTE’S MASKED APPLES AT SOTHEBY’S IN PARIS

    Monday, July 31st, 2023
    René Magritte – La Valse Hésitation (1955). UPDATE: THIS MADE €11,177,000

    René Magritte’s Masked Apples will make their auction debut at Sotheby’s in Paris on October 19 with an estimate of €10-15 million. This is the highest ever estimate for a work of art at Sotheby’s in France. La Valse hésitation depicts two masked apples shrouded in night-time shadows, against the backdrop of a bright blue sky peppered with Magritte’s characteristic clouds. The motif was conceived in the early 1950s, at the same moment as his most important series – L’Empire des Lumières – was similarly seeking to capture the paradox of day meeting night.

    The painting has not been seen in public since 1979, where it was the subject of an exhibition at the Galerie Isy Brachot, and has since been treasured in three private collections in the artist’s homeland of Belgium. It is coming to the open market for the first time. The apple is central to Magritte’s oeuvre – and the countless iterations he inspired in popular culture. Here, the apple – an intimate object familiar from the centuries-old artistic tradition of the still life and harking back to the Garden of Eden – is transformed into a mysterious, anthropomorphic character. With the addition of a simple mask, without any facial features, Magritte opens to the door to countless possibilities.

    Sotheby’s Paris Modernités auction on 19 October will present works by artists from the emergence of the European avant-garde to the Post-War period, showcasing the modernist movements across Europe and the overlapping dialogues within this rich artistic moment.

    HIGHEST PRICE EVER FOR A PAINTING IN GBP IN EUROPE

    Friday, March 4th, 2022
    Rene Magritte – L’empire des lumières.

    Magritte’s L’empire des lumières (1961) made £59,422,000 ($79.8 million) at Sotheby’s Modern and Contemporary evening auction. This was the highest price ever paid for a painting in GBP in Europe and it tripled the artist’s record. The paradox at its core, as in all of Magritte’s best work, is the artist probing an inherently magical quality as the opposite of our everyday. ‘I have always felt the greatest interest in night and day, without however having any preference for one or the other,’ noted Magritte. ‘This great personal interest in night and day is a feeling of admiration and astonishment.

    Claude Monet’s limpid  Nympheas (1914–1917) – described by the artist as being ‘the illusion of an endless whole, of a watery surface with no horizon and no shore… made £23,228,500.

    (See post on antiquesandartireland.com for February 16, 2022)

    FIVE MONETS AND A MAGRITTE

    Wednesday, February 16th, 2022

    NO less than five works by Claude Monet and a 1961 masterwork by René Magritte will highlight Sotheby’s Modern and Contemporary evening auction in London on March 2. The sale spans Cubism, Futurism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art. Monet x Monet from an American collection presents five works by Claude Monet (with estimates of from £1.2 million to £15 million) painted during a formative fifteen-year period during his career, charting the artist’s pivot from an Impressionist painter to the father of Abstract Expressionism. 

    Claude Monet – Les Demoiselles de Giverny. UPDATE: THIS WAS THE ONLY ONE OF THE MONET’S TO REMAIN UNSOLD

    Magritte’s L’empire des lumières captures the visual paradox that lies at the heart of the artist’s originality. The instantly recognisable work was created in 1961 for Baroness Anne-Marie Gillion Crowet, the daughter of Magritte’s patron the Belgian Surrealist collector Pierre Crowet, and has remained in the family ever since.

    Rene Magritte – L’empire des lumières. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR 59,422,000 GBP

    Here is a video from Sotheby’s about the Monet’s in the sale:

    A WORK THAT CAPTURES THE PARADOX OF MAGRITTE’S ORIGINALITY

    Thursday, January 13th, 2022
    René Magritte, L’empire des lumières, 1961

    René Magritte’s L’empire des lumières captures the visual paradox that lies at the heart of the artist’s originality. With an estimate in excess of $60 million this masterpiece of 20th century art will be offered as a highlight of Sotheby’s Modern & Contemporary evening auction in London on March 2. It has been on loan to the Musée Magritte in Brussels from 2009-2020. It was created in 1961 for Baroness Anne-Marie Gillion Crowet, the daughter of Magritte’s patron the Belgian Surrealist collector Pierre Crowet, and has remained in the family ever since. 

    A SURREAL MASTERPIECE AT CHRISTIE’S

    Friday, January 10th, 2020

    Rene Magritte’s A la rencontre du plaisir (Towards Pleasure) comes up at Christie’s Surreal auction in London on February 5. It combines several if his most iconic motifs into a single, evocative image, creating an elegant summation of the poetic imagination which fuelled his unique form of Surrealism. Purchased directly from the artist shortly after its creation, the painting has remained in the same family collection for over half a century, and is coming to auction for the first time and is estimated at £8-12 million.

    René Magritte, À la rencontre du plaisir UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £18.9 million

    FLYING START TO 20TH CENTURY SALES AT CHRISTIE’S

    Wednesday, March 1st, 2017

    René Magritte – La corde sensible

    A combined total of £136,874,598 was realised at the Impressionist & Modern Art evening sale and Art of the Surreal  which launched 20th Century at Christie’s in London last night. The top lot was Paul Gauguin’s Te Fare (La maison) which made £20,325,000. René Magritte’s La corde sensible set a new world record at auction for the artist of £14,441,348. The evening saw an electric start with lively bidding for Portrait de Lluis Alemany, a work dating from the very beginning of Picasso’s career (£773,000), and continued with Berthe Morisot’s Femme en noir or Avant le théâtre which achieved £2,045,000 against a pre-sale estimate of £600,000-800,000 and Femme et enfant au balcon also by Morisot, which more than doubled its high estimate to realise £4,085,000.

    The nine further works from the personal collection of Barbara Lambrecht, including paintings by Kees van Dongen, Raoul Dufy, Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Félix Vallotton, each sold above estimate with the group totalling £15,945,000 to date. All proceeds are to benefit the Rubens Prize Collection at the Museum of Contemporary Art Siegen.  There was sell through rates of 92% by lot and 96% by value and registered bidders from 39 countries across five continents demonstrate continued global interest from buyers with notable bidding from Asia.

    IMPRESSIONIST, MODERN AND SURREALIST ART AUCTIONS

    Sunday, January 31st, 2016

    An exceptional painting by Henri Matisse  is a highlight at Sotheby’s in London on February 3.  The Impressionist and Modern Art and Surrealist evening sales feature a variety of masterpieces.  The Matisse – entitled La Lecon de piano – has emerged after 85 years in a private collection and is estimated at £12-18 million. Here is a quick preview:

    (See posts on antiquesandartireland.com for January 27, 2016 and December 23, 2015)

    Rene Magritte - Sheherazade (£500,000-700,000).

    Rene Magritte – Sheherazade (£500,000-700,000).  UPDATE: THIS MADE £785,000

    Paul Signac - Voile dans la brume. Canal de la Giudecca (£850,000-1.2 million).

    Paul Signac – Voile dans la brume. Canal de la Giudecca (£850,000-1.2 million).  UPDATE: THIS  SOLD FOR £1,025,000

    Francis Picabia - Le Ventilateur (£1.8-2.5 million,

    Francis Picabia – Le Ventilateur (£1.8-2.5 million,  UPDTE: THIS MADE £2.3 MILLION

    Rene Magritte - L'usage de la parole (£500,000-700,000).

    Rene Magritte – L’usage de la parole (£500,000-700,000).   UPDATE: THIS MADE £965,000