Pablo Picasso’s 1932 artwork “Woman with a Watch” was auctioned off for $139 million, marking the second-highest price ever for a Picasso piece, according to reports by Reuters and Bloomberg on May 8th (local time).
The “Woman with a Watch,” sold at the Sotheby’s auction in New York, is a portrait of Picasso’s lover, Marie-Thérèse Walter. Picasso, at the age of 45, met Walter when she was 17 and had a secret affair with her while still married to Olga Khokhlova.
This piece was part of the collection of real estate developer Emily Fisher Landau, who passed away earlier this year. It became the second most expensive Picasso sold at auction after “Les Femmes d’Alger,” which was auctioned for $179.3 million (approximately $234 billion) in 2015. It also became the most expensive artwork sold in the global auction market this year.
Bloomberg predicted that no other artwork in the upcoming fall auction season could surpass the auction price of “Woman with a Watch.”
Simon Shaw, Vice Chairman of Sotheby’s Global Fine Arts, said to The Guardian, “Picasso is known for his passion, but his passion for watches is not well known. He was an incredibly stylish man and a great watch appraiser. Even his photos wearing a watch received high praise from watch collectors.”
Meanwhile, the fall auction season of the world’s three major companies – Sotheby’s, Christie’s, and Phillips – is expected to feature artworks worth $2.5 billion. The Guardian predicted that the sales from the Landau collection alone could reach £500 million (approximately $611 million).
Claude Monet’s “The Water Lily Pond” is expected to be featured at Christie’s auction on September 9th, along with works by Andy Warhol and Mark Rothko from the Landau collection.
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