Giambattista Tiepolo
The Arrival of Henry III at the Villa Contarini
Simone Martini
The Virgin Annunciate
Tiepolo, Canaletto, Martini lead old master’s auctions Sotheby’s annual Old Masters Week auctions in New York brought $67.7 million led by Canaletto, Cranach and Martini. Christie’s realizes $34,3 million highlighted by Tiepolo’s ‘The Arrival of Henry III at the Villa Contarini’.]]>
January 27, 2012, source: Sotheby’s / Christie’s / theartwolf
Sotheby’s auction was led by Canaletto’s “View of the Churches of the Redentore and San Giacomo” from the Estate of Lady Forte that sold for $5,682,500, and Lucas Cranach the Elder’s portrait Lucretia that brought $5,122,500.
The most important painting in the auction was Simone Martini’s “The Virgin Annunciate”, which brought $4,114,500. George Wachter, Co-Chairman of Sotheby’s Old Master Paintings department,and Christopher Apostle, Head of Sotheby’s Old Master Paintings department in New York, commented that they were “particularly encouraged by the strong demand for Italian painting, with early pictures and gold grounds performing particularly well.”
The sale featured an Italian Renaissance “Portrait of a Young Man” attributed to Piero del Pollaiuolo, which sold to the J. Paul Getty museum in California for $1,398,500. “This acquisition anchors and provides context for the Museum’s Italian Renaissance drawings collection, one of the strongest of any U.S. museum,” explains Lee Hendrix, senior curator of drawings at the Getty Museum.
At Christie’s, Giambattista Tiepolo’s “The Arrival of Henry III at the Villa Contarini” fetched $5,906,500, the highest price of the sale. A painting by Frans Hals offered from The Collection of Elizabeth Taylor fetched $2,098,500; soaring beyond its pre-sale estimate of $700,000-$1 million. The sale price places the work among the top ten prices ever achieved for the artist’s works at auction.
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