In brief
The Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer by Gustav Klimt made headlines as it sold for $236.4 million at Sotheby's in New York, making it the second highest priced artwork auctioned to date. The 20-minute bidding war involved six participants. The painting has a tumultuous history, having been looted by the Nazis and almost destroyed, but it was successfully rescued and has since changed hands several times. The current sale exceeded projections and was part of a larger auction that included several other notable Klimt works.
A portrait by the Austrian artist Gustav Klimt was sold for $236.4m (£179m) in New York on Tuesday, making it the second most expensive piece ever sold at auction. Six people took part in a 20-minute bidding battle for the Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer, which was painted between 1914 and 1916. Auction house Sotheby's has not disclosed the buyer's identity.The portrait was looted by the Nazis and almost destroyed in a fire in World War Two, but was rescued in 1948. The artwork was returned to Lederer's brother, Erich, a friend and subject of Klimt's contemporary, Egon Schiele. The piece remained in Lederer's possession for most of his life, before he sold it in 1983, according to Sotheby's.The painting shows Lederer, an heiress and the daughter of one of Klimt's patrons, wearing a white robe and standing in front of a blue tapestry covered in Asian motifs. The Nazis, who annexed Austria in 1938, looted the Lederer art collection but left family portraits behind, says the National Gallery of Canada.Estée Lauder heir Leonard A. Lauder made it part of his private collection in 1985, where it was displayed in his Fifth Avenue home in New York. Tuesday's sale shot past expectations, with the painting predicted to sell for $150m before the auction. The second highest sale for a Klimt on record was Lady with a Fan, which sold for $108.8m in 2023 in London.Several other Klimt works in Lauder's collection were auctioned at the same event, including Flowering Meadow and Forest Slope at Unterach am Attersee, which fetched between $60m and $80m each.The most expensive artwork ever sold at auction was Salvator Mundi, attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, which sold in 2017 for $450.3m. Tuesday also saw a sculpture of a fully functioning gold toilet by the conceptual artist Maurizio Cattelan pick up $12.1m just an hour after the record-breaking Klimt sale. The 101-kg toilet received just one bid. Sotheby's said that the buyer was a famous American brand.
