Mona Lisa. There are a great many superb extant pen and pencil drawings from this period, including many technical sketchesfor example, pumps, military weapons, mechanical apparatusthat offer evidence of Leonardos interest in and knowledge of technical matters even at the outset of his career. for the highest price sold. If all we do is adjust the $30.8 million that Gates paid for it for inflation, that gets us to somewhere around $50 million today. But, because of the imminent danger of war, the metal, ready to be poured, was used to make cannons instead, causing the project to come to a halt. TINDERA: That's right. This painting depicted St. Anne, her daughter the Virgin Mary, and the infant Jesus. No one in the art world knows for sure where the painting is. Inside besides da Vinci's writings, there are also about 360 drawings and diagrams throughout the manuscript. Leonardo da Vincis parents were unmarried at the time of his birth near a small village named Vinci in Tuscany. The source says he advised the government that "exhibiting under the Saudi conditions would be like laundering a piece that cost $450 million". He was known to be fastidious in personal care, keeping a beard neat and trim in later age, and to dress in colorful clothing in styles that dismissed current customs. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. This wall painting in the Dominican monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan, allowed Leonardo to explore how the body communicates inner states of being. This Leonardo da Vinci's portrait paintings are of Ginevra de' Benci, who was a rather popular Florentine woman. "And it is involved therefore in the politics around culture. Later in 2002, Thomson donated his private collection, including the Rubens, to the. Like we did earlier in this episode, he considered the price that it sold for in 1980. Son of Daniel (conductor & cellist) and Eleanore Saidenberg who were Picasso's New York dealers from 1955 to 1973. SIMON: My feeling was that the Codex was quite a bit more valuable than any single drawing would be. And it was, you know, a thrilling project to be involved with. The Annunciation by Leonardo da Vinci. And my enjoyment in owning these wonderful works of art. Before Rybolovlev, Salvator Mundi had been owned by a consortium of dealers including Alexander Parish, who had picked it up for $10,000 at an estate sale in the US in 2005, and had had it restored and authenticated. Various vandals have tried to harm da Vinci's famed masterpiece, and 1956 was a particularly bad year. A New York Times story on the sale remarked that it was the highest price ever paid at auction for a manuscript. The two documentaries arrive at a time when films, podcasts and pop culture itself seem fascinated by art crimes, mysteries and forgeries. The writings in his notebooks suggest that he may have been a vegetarian, and there is also some speculation that he may have been gay. A Leonardo da Vinci painting has sold for a record-breaking $450 million this week, at Christie's auction house in New York. Last Supper, Italian Cenacolo, one of the most famous artworks in the world, painted by Leonardo da Vinci probably between 1495 and 1498 for the Dominican monastery Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan. Leonardo devoted 12 yearswith interruptionsto this task. Yves Bouvier, a Swiss art dealer, bought the painting from the New York dealers for $83 million, reportedly on behalf of his client, a Russian oligarch named Dmitry Rybolovlev, though this is disputed by Mr Bouvier. This is the mirror where we flip it around, and now here it is in English. TINDERA: Okay, so our $4 billion estimate isn't all that realistic. Highly esteemed, he was constantly kept busy as a painter and sculptor and as a designer of court festivals. $50 million through Sothebys in 1997. And Lewis points out that as the art market has enlarged, our world view itself has changed. The work of Leonardo is just as influential to the art that is being created today as it was in the 15th and 16th centuries, he said. [8] The actual purchase price was not disclosed, because of a confidentiality agreement attached to the private sale. Leonardo da Vinci was a Renaissance painter, sculptor, architect, inventor, military engineer and draftsman the epitome of a true Renaissance man. Most observers agree that it is likely stashed in the Middle East, but some have speculated that it is stored in a tax-free zone in Geneva or even on the Prince's half-a-billion-dollar yacht. Apparently, Hammer had made a habit of buying things with Occidental Petroleum money. Art restorer Dianne Modestini in a scene from The Lost Leonardo, one of two new documentaries about the Salvator Mundi (Credit: Sony Pictures Classics/Entertainment Pictures). Something like the first printing in North America, or the first time a new word was used in print. But many experts on camera and elsewhere in the press think he leapt to an early conclusion. St John the Baptist by Leonardo da Vinci. He applied his creativity to every realm in which graphic representation is used: he was a painter, sculptor, architect, and engineer. She spent years restoring the painting, and passionately defends its authenticity in precise detail, pointing out the pentimento under Christ's thumb or a curve of his mouth that could only be Leonardo's. She even has her own mailbox. Amid all of that the Codex went back to Christie's in 1994, where it was once again expected to bring $10 million. A lost painting by Leonardo da Vinci may have been found in a Scottish farmhouse, reported The Daily Mail. And so, the first place we looked were the auction records for the Codex from the 1980 and the 1994 sales. And to put into perspective, how much less art sold for 40 years ago, the sale of the Codex was the fifth-highest price for any piece of art sold at auction ever. Leonardo did not seriously study Latin, the key language of traditional learning, until much later, when he acquired a working knowledge of it on his own. It then becomes a first edition of Moby Dick. However, other critics have disagreed with the truth of that claim. In 1493 the clay model of the horse was put on public display on the occasion of the marriage of Emperor Maximilian to Bianca Maria Sforza, and preparations were made to cast the colossal figure, which was to be 16 feet (5 metres) high. I wana write a poem about it. He also worked in the next-door workshop of artist Antonio del Pollaiuolo, a sculptor, painter, engraver, and goldsmith, who frequently worked with his brother, Piero. In both films, Luke Syson, the curator of the show, stands by his decision. a 2011 exhibition at the National Gallery in London, Art Bust: Scandalous Stories of the Art World, Kim Kardashian was photographed next to it. Steve Wynn, who bid on the painting at auction, privately acquired the work several months later from the unidentified buyer for an undisclosed, supposedly lower price. And then amid. Self-portrait as Archangel Gabriel unveiled, Queen's Leonardo da Vinci drawings to be shown across UK cities, Salvator Mundi by Leonardo Da Vinci before and after restoration. This stands as the most expensive painting by a living artist. SIMON: It's a truly horrific prospect. 1 for US$44.4 million (equivalent to US$50.8million in 2021). At $28 million. That he gave up both projects seems to indicate that he had deeper reasons for leaving Florence. Amidst all these delightfully tangled histories, nothing rivals the Salvator Mundi. The bidding then resumed: $353m, $355m. Five are traditional Chinese paintings by Qi Baishi, Wu Bin, Wang Meng and Xu Yang. TINDERA: Hammer is also the great-grandfather of Hollywood actor Armie Hammer. They arrive in the wake of Ben Lewis's high-profile 2019 book, The Last Leonardo, and dozens of articles. It next appeared at a Sotheby's in England in 1958 where it sold for 45 - about $125 at the time. The role of most of these associates is unclear, leading to the question of Leonardos so-called apocryphal works, on which the master collaborated with his assistants. ", https://www.telegraph.co.uk/luxury/art/art-sales-russian-buyers-inject-confidence-into-old-master-marke/, Picasso piece sets record for art sold at auction, qatar may have purchased Warhol's 'Eight Elvises', "Nahmads confirm Picasso's $115m flower girl will go to Paris", "Rockefeller Picasso sells for $115 million including feesauthor=Robert Frank", "DIC Sells 'Anna's Light' Painting For Y10.3bn Gain", "Regarding extraordinary profit associated with the sale of a certain painting owned by the company and revision of its consolidated operating result forecast", "How Basquiat Became the $60 Million Man", "A Basquiat Sells for 'Mind-Blowing' $110.5 Million at Auction", A Monet Sells for $110.7 Million, an Auction High for an Impressionist Work, "Qatar bought Ford House's $100-million Cezanne", "$100M for Czanne painting? It may have been that the rather sophisticated spirit of Neoplatonism prevailing in the Florence of the Medici went against the grain of Leonardos experience-oriented mind and that the more strict, academic atmosphere of Milan attracted him. While Hammer was alive, we reported that Oxy shareholders sued three times asking to be reimbursed for what Hammer spent on art and the museum. His drawing of the Vitruvian Man (c. 1490) has also become a cultural icon. The sale of Vincent van Gogh's Sunflowers was the first time a "modern" (in this case 1888) painting became the record holder, as opposed to the old master paintings which previously had dominated the market. In fact, it was also noted in the Codexs 1994 auction catalogue written by late da Vinci scholar Carlo Pedretti, that the Mona Lisa is, "indeed a visual synthesis of Leonardo's scientific knowledge as summed up in the Codex.". It came close. Lady with an Ermine by Leonardo da Vinci. The painting sold for $119,922,500, Picassos Nude, Green Leaves and Bust (1932) sold at Christie's in New York for $106,482,500, Lhomme qui Marche I (1961) by Alberto Giacometti sold for 65,001,250 ($105,182,398) at Sothebys in London, Picassos Boy With a Pipe (1905) sold at Sotheby's in New York for $104,168,000, Gustav Klimts Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer II (1912)went under the hammer at Christies New York and sold for $87,936,000, Francis Bacons Triptych (1976) sold for $85.9m to oligarch Roman Abramovich, A Chinese 18th century Qianlong dynasty porcelain vase sold for 53,100,000 ($85,921,461) at Bainbridges auction house in London, Dora Maar au Chat (1941) by Pablo Picasso sold for 51,560,080 ($83,429,503) at Sotheby's in London, Portrait of Dr Paul Gachet (1890) by Vincent van Gogh sold for $82,500,000 (50,985,692) at Christies in New York, Thank you all for your bidding, said Pylkknen. In 1993, Simon was hired by the trustees of the Armand Hammer Museum to do an appraisal of the Codex back when it was known as the Codex Hammer. SIMON: He spent much more time as a writer, a scientist, a draftsman than he did as a painter. Portrait of Ginevra de' Benci by Leonardo da Vinci. ARCHIVAL CLIP OF ARMAND HAMMER: I guess I'm wearing a great many hats. So, we reached out to Martin Kemp, who is another da Vinci scholar, and an Oxford University emeritus professor. Alan Wintermute, a senior specialist in old master paintings at Christies in London, called it the holy grail of old masters. He was described in our Forbes 400 issue of the magazine that year as both a hard worker and brutally candid.. Guinness World Records lists Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa as having the highest ever insurance value for a painting. But if our maximum value isn't $4 billion, then what is it? There are all sorts of factors that come into play: condition, provenance. Probably, they knew there was room before the end of the competition., They wanted to get the job done quicker, but it still took a long time.. Thanks for having me. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Salvator Mundi, the long-lost Leonardo da Vinci painting of Jesus Christ commissioned by King Louis XII of France more than 500 years ago, has sold at Christies in New York for $450.3m, including auction house premium, shattering the world record for any work of art sold at auction. [11][12] Prices realised for just his nine paintings listed below, when adjusted for inflation to 2017, add up to over US$900million. A major turning point came when the painting was controversially displayed as an authentic Leonardo at a 2011 exhibition at the National Gallery in London. The London art dealer Philip Mould called the idea of including Salvator Mundi in a contemporary sale inspired. He needed to do that because in order to pay the inheritance taxes on a previous Earl of Leicester, who died in 1976, they needed to sell off some stuff. As late as the press preview of the show, there was an empty space on the wall waiting for the Salvator Mundi, but it never arrived. An artist by disposition and endowment, he considered his eyes to be his main avenue to knowledge; to Leonardo, sight was mans highest sense because it alone conveyed the facts of experience immediately, correctly, and with certainty. The series is full of conspiracy theories about the never-solved robbery. (Swiss authorities investigated him for defrauding Rybolovlev over several artworks, but this year closed the case without charging him.) That's because da Vinci wrote it backwards, which is what he did for much of what he wrote. Sowhat do we do with any of that? But even then, many Leonardo experts were dubious that the painting had more than a few brush strokes by him, and those doubts have ramped up ever since. What was Leonardo da Vincis family like? According to the Christie's auction catalogue for the 1994 sale, the Codex was described as being in good and stable condition. Following the French Revolution it was moved to the Louvre. Finding a new one is rarer than finding a new planet, he said. On November 20, 2014 at Sotheby's, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art bought her 1932 painting Jimson Weed/White Flower No. The rest are owned by museums around the world. PETERSON-WITHORN: Yeah, when I heard about that $12 million sale, I remembered that the Codex had about 360 illustrations inside of it. Portrait of a Man in Red Chalk Drawing by Leonardo da Vinci. Pablo Picasso "Garon la pipe" (1905): $142.7 million 8. "As long as this painting is hidden from the world and the future and fate of this painting is unknown, it's going to be clouded in a realm of mystery and the world will be ready to read anything new. His curiosity and insatiable hunger for knowledge never left him. Early Life: Verrocchio's Pupil. This time, though, it sold for three times that in the battle we heard about at the beginning of the episode between Gates and the Italian bank. She tells BBC Culture, "Since then, Dianne Modestini continued to work on it. A Leonardo, even one as dulled as this, could prove an amusing conversation piece. Gifted with a curious mind and a brilliant. Its the zenith of my career as an auctioneer. We asked Robert, if the Codex if it went up for sale again, could it compete with the Mundi's price? Christies had also found placing the work, despite its celebrity, hard to fathom. The sale places Salvator Mundi as the highest-priced work sold privately or at auction, including Pablo Picassos 1955 Women of Algiers (Version O), sold for $179.4m, and Amedeo Modiglianis 1917-18 Reclining Nude, sold for $170.4m. It then disappeared again until it was bought at a small U.S. auction house in 2005. CHASE PETERSON-WITHORN: Hi, Michela. In 1472 Leonardo was accepted into the painters guild of Florence, but he remained in his teachers workshop for five more years, after which time he worked independently in Florence until 1481. Cole was the first to report, in March 2020, the existence of a 46-page booklet the Louvre prepared for publication but never released, which asserts that the piece is an authentic Leonardo. On the telephone in this room at $28 million. When it sold in 1994, it was also expected to sell for $10 million, but ended up selling for three times that. [note 1] Where necessary, the price is first converted to dollars using the exchange rate at the time the painting was sold. So next, we decided to try some sources who not only know Old Masters works, but they know da Vinci really well. Using monthly averages gives slightly different numbers, most significantly for paintings sold early or late in a year with significant inflation. As of 2023, Leonardo da Vinci's net worth is $320 million. According to some sources, the painting had been sold by Argentinian art collector Nelly Arrieta de Blaquier for $300 million,[9] but the price was not confirmed by any of the parties involved.[10]. He said that he would guess that if the Codex were to go up for auction again, the auction estimate for the item might be $150 million. They bought it from an auction in Louisiana for just over $1,000. The Netflix series This Is a Robbery delves into the 1990 theft of masterworks including a Rembrandt from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. His shares were of limited value when he was given them, but by the time of Facebook's IPO they were valued at around $200 million. The Virgin and Child with St Anne was painted by Leonardo Da Vinci in 1510. However, we should probably note that it seems unlikely that as the owner of the Codex, Gates would actually do this. I've worked as well as an art appraiser. Here's how much the artwork is worth! Renaissance artist, inventor, polymath, musician, and architect who painted the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper and drew the iconic Vitruvian Man. TINDERA: I'm Michela Tindera, and this is Priceless. The saleroom erupted in cheers and applause. It is Oil on wood and measures 168 x 130 cm (5 1/2 x 4 1/2 ft.). Georgia O'Keeffe holds the record for the highest price paid for a painting by a woman. PETERSON-WITHORN: Yeah, and Gates loves books. Source: pinterest.com. Any more? Christies sells long-lost Salvator Mundi, artwork billed as biggest discovery of the 21st century, for $400m plus auction house premium. But now the Salvator Mundi has become the poster boy for the volatile mix of money, power and geopolitics that defines the art world today. One of two pastel versions; another two painted versions (and lithography) exist, all created by Munch. (According to contemporary sources, Leonardo was commissioned to create three more pictures, but these works have since disappeared or were never done.) Trained in Florence as a painter and sculptor in the workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio (1435-1488), Leonardo is also celebrated for his scientific contributions. The subjects range from Inigo Philbrick, criminally charged with defrauding clients by selling more than 100% of shares in artworks, to a golden Egyptian coffin whose smuggled past came to light after Kim Kardashian was photographed next to it at the Metropolitan Museum's Costume Institute gala. (Maybe so, but in the films and other reproduced images it does have a more cloying look). His notebooks reveal a spirit of scientific inquiry and a mechanical inventiveness that were centuries ahead of their time. Kenneth Griffin acquired it in 2004 from Wynn. MICHELA TINDERA: So its 1994, and were listening to an auction in a salesroom at Christie's in Manhattan. The painting, which dates to around 1500, was lost to history for more than 200 years, was damaged and badly restored, and was sold and resold as a minor work, probably by a Leonardo acolyte. [6] Though the Louvre Museum had turned down the opportunity to purchase it for 100 million,[7] the painting was estimated to sell for $110 to $170 million. Corrections? One of the most famous paintings in the world, the Last Supper was commissioned by Ludovico Sforza, duke of Milan and Leonardo's patron during his first stay in that city, for the Dominican monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie. In Verrocchios renowned workshop Leonardo received multifaceted training that included painting and sculpture as well as the technical-mechanical arts. And we're going to show you how we narrowed that range to settle on one number. A jump to $370. Leonardo da Vinci not only developed his skill in drawing, painting and sculpting during his apprenticeship, but through others working in and around the studio, he picked up knowledge in such diverse fields as mechanics, carpentry, metallurgy, architectural drafting and chemistry. TINDERA: The Italian government had reportedly been expected to participate in the auction. We know quite a bit about Leonardo's life from a mini-biography by Giorgio Vasari, a Leonardo fanboy and the world's first art historian.Born a nobody, Leonardo was a charismatic and complicated man self confident and not, driven and not, distracted and not. Ludovicos fall in 1499 sealed the fate of this abortive undertaking, which was perhaps the grandest concept of a monument in the 15th century. PETERSON-WITHORN: Exactly. Record private sales are believed to include $250m for a painting by Paul Czanne and $300m for a Paul Gauguin. Simon has said that it took a couple of years after they bought the painting to become convinced himself that he was dealing with an original work by Leonardo. And so, you've got the painting itself is you know, much more of a rare object. JoinBBC Culture Film and TV Clubon Facebook, a community for cinephiles all over the world. The original one is now located at Muse du Louvre, Paris. Scholars have been unable to agree in their attributions of these works. The triptych had probably been reassembled by the Italian collector Francesco De Simone Niquesa, but were resold to a person in the US before 2013, This is the small version of the painting; the large version is at the. The Nahmad family bought Suprematist Composition in 2008 at Sotheby's, New York, for $60,002,500 ($76million in 2021 dollars) from the heirs of Kazimir Malevich. An exceptional case is graffiti artist David Choe, who accepted payment in shares for painting graffiti art in the headquarters of a fledgling Facebook. It looks interesting. I'm going to show it all over the world.. In 1482 Leonardo moved to Milan to work in the service of the citys dukea surprising step when one realizes that the 30-year-old artist had just received his first substantial commissions from his native city of Florence: the unfinished panel painting Adoration of the Magi for the monastery of San Donato a Scopeto and an altar painting for the St. Bernard Chapel in the Palazzo della Signoria, which was never begun. A Belgian banker and collector who bought it in 1939 for $18,000. [15] Not listed here in this list is Chinese painter Wang Shaofei's The High Sun, which was appraised for $74 million in 2017.[16]. But he went even beyond that. The Christie's sale itself was a highly staged drama, beginning with a marketing video that showed not the painting but the faces of observers most are ordinary people but one of them is Leonardo DiCaprio looking reverently at the image as if they were seeing Christ himself. Updates? Art Sales: Russian buyers inject confidence into Old Master market: Last edited on 21 February 2023, at 19:17, Pendant portraits of Maerten Soolmans and Oopjen Coppit, La Montagne Sainte-Victoire vue du bosquet du Chteau Noir, Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), Portrait of a Young Man holding a Roundel, Triptych Inspired by the Oresteia of Aeschylus, Peasant Woman Against a Background of Wheat, Femme au bret et la robe quadrille (Marie-Thrse Walter), List of most expensive artworks by living artists, List of most expensive non-fungible tokens, List of most expensive books and manuscripts, Abu Dhabi Department of Culture & Tourism, For Founders to Decorators, Facebook Riches, Mystery Buyer of Work Attributed to Caravaggio Revealed, Caravaggio Painting Estimated at $170 M. Sold Privately Ahead of Auction in France, "El enigma detrs del Van Gogh que sali de la Argentina", "The Red Vineyard Painting at annaboch.com", "Anna Boch.com Impressionist, patron of many artists", "The Most Expensive Female Artists 2016 artnet News", "The Chinese Ink Paintings of Wang Shaofei Break the World Record", "Abu Dhabi to acquire Leonardo da Vinci's 'Salvator Mundi': Christie's", "A Leonardo Made a $450 Million Splash. Leonardo grew up on his fathers familys estate, where he was treated as a legitimate son and received the usual elementary education of the day: reading, writing, and arithmetic. Or is it? This means the Codex is certainly one of the world's most valuable pieces of art. In November 2017 Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman paid $450 million for a da Vinci painting. Well, as we mentioned, the most expensive painting ever sold at auction was the Salvator Mundi for $450 million. Also of note is the decorative ceiling painting (1498) he made for the Sala delle Asse in the Milan Castello Sforzesco. His father, Ser Piero, was a Florentine notary and landlord, and his mother, Caterina, was a young peasant woman who shortly thereafter married an artisan. There is so much information in the public sphere that everyone can have the illusion of being an insider. As a master artist, Leonardo maintained an extensive workshop in Milan, employing apprentices and students. Robert Simon told us that he thought it would not sell for less than $150 million. It stayed with the Earl of Leicesters estate until 1980, when it finally went up for auction. The painting was sold in November 2017,[1][2] through the auction house Christie's in New York City. With its sleek narrative and a wide range of voices from dealers to art historians to investigative journalists, The Lost Leonardo is the better of the two films, and benefits greatly from using Modestini as its main character. Quiz: Ancient Illustrations Showing Us the Way, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Leonardo-da-Vinci, Social Studies for Kids - Biography of Leonardo da Vinci, Humanities LibreTexts - Leonardo da Vinci, Art Encyclopedia - Biography of Leonardo Da Vinci, University of California Museum of Paleontology - Biography of Leonardo da Vinci, Web Gallery of Art - Biography of Leonardo da Vinci, Leonardo da Vinci - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Leonardo da Vinci - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up), Art and accomplishment: Leonardo as artist-scientist, Art and accomplishment: Painting and drawing. It depicts the dramatic scene described in several closely connected moments in the Gospels, including Matthew 26: . And it was a challenge. If you would like to comment on this story or anything else you have seen on BBC Culture, head over to ourFacebookpage or message us onTwitter. A scene from Saviour for Sale, a second documentary about the Salvator Mundi, by French journalist Antoine Vitkine (Credit: Zadig Productions). PETERSON-WITHORN: Armand placed the winning bid and paid about $5.6 million for the Codex, which was less than the roughly $10 million that it was reported experts thought it might sell for. Before the auction opened, the 500-year-old Leonardo da Vinci painting was estimated to sell for $100 million. He created something he called the Codescope, which was software built to help museum-goers actually read da Vinci's backwards scrawl. The disciples, devastated by Christ stating one of them would cause his death, convey their feelings dramatically through their body language. He was the auctioneer at the 1994 Christie's sale. An attempt to psychoanalyze the buyer of Leonardo da Vinci's 'Salvator Mundi.' Tim Schneider , November 17, 2017 The scene at Christie's New York on November 15. Leonardos artistic inclinations must have appeared early. However, weeks after the grand opening of his museum, where he planned to showcase the Codex and other art he had collected over the years, Hammer died at the age of 92. Leonardo grew up on his fathers familys estate, where he was treated as a legitimate son and received the usual elementary education of that day: reading, writing, and arithmetic. Bouviers mark-up led to Rybolovlevs criminal complaint in a Mongasque court, alleging a scheme for overcharging him. So Gates buying Leonardo da Vinci's notebook is the equivalent of a typical 66-year-old splurging ona new iPad. There are more and more platforms for telling stories. The quality of the painting itself divides people. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. This episode was reported by Michela Tindera, produced by Michela Tindera and Jonathan Palmer, with additional research by Sue Radlauer. Both sold at Sotheby's in Monaco on the same date in 1989. The artwork alone garners thousands of visitors from around the world to the famous gallery it is placed in - the . PETERSON-WITHORN: And in fact, that fall he had just appeared atop our Forbes 400 ranking of the richest Americans, with an estimated net worth of $9.35 billion. PETERSON-WITHORN: After the auction, he told the press, I'm very happy with the price.