Andy Warhol’s iconic 1964 portrait of Marilyn Monroe was auctioned off for a whopping $193 million, making it the most expensive piece of American art ever sold.
“Shot Sage Blue Marilyn,” one of many images the pop artist created of Monroe in the 1960s, was put up for sale at Christie’s in New York Monday night. The auction house described the piece as “one of the rarest and most transcendent images in existence.”
The portrait has previously been shown at galleries around the world, including the Centre Pompidou in Paris and London’s Tate Modern and the Guggenheim Museum in New York.
It’s sale marked the second-most expensive piece of art auctioned in history, trailing only Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi,” which sold for $450 million in 2017. The Monroe image, made just two years after her death, is also the most expensive piece from the 20th century ever auctioned, according to Christie’s.
The previous record holder was Pablo Picasso’s 1955 piece, “Les Femmes d’Alger (Version O),” sold for $179.4 million in 2015.
The sale of the 40-inch silkscreen additionally unseated the record holder for the priciest piece of American art to go under the hammer. Late Brooklyn Artist, Jean-Michel Basquiat, previously claimed the top spot for his untitled 1982 skull painting, which netted $110.5 million dollars at a Sotheby’s auction in New York in 2017.
Warhol had held the record before Basquiat after his 1963 work ”Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster)” sold for $105.4 million in 2013.
While the portrait’s new owner remained unidentified, the proceeds of the sale will go to the Thomas and Doris Ammann Foundation Zurich, established to assist children with health care and educational programs.
With News Wire Services
