95 million

Picasso Portrait Sells for $95.2M

Filed under: Auctions

Sotheby's Impressionist and Modern Art Evening sale went off beautifully last night to a better result than they had anticipated. The star piece of the auction, a portrait of Picasso's mistress titled Dora Maar au chat, sold for $95.2 million, almost double the guaranteed price of $50 million set by the auction house. It is one of the most expensive paintings ever to be sold at auction, second only to another Picasso, Garcon a la pipe, which sold at a Sotheby's auction in 2004 for $104 million. Another record setting piece was Matisse's Nu couché vu de dos, which was bought for just under $18.5 million, the highest price paid for a Matisse to date. A total of 27 of the 55 offered lots sold for over $1 million. The sales for the auction totaled $207.6 million.