NEW YORK: What is the only Da Vinci painting on the open market worth? A Russian billionaire believes he was swindled when he bought it for $127.5 million. This week he’ll find out if he was right.
“Salvator Mundi,” a painting of Jesus Christ by the Renaissance polymath Leonardo da Vinci circa 1500, is the star lot in New York’s November art auctions that will see Christie’s and Sotheby’s chase combined art sales of more than $1 billion.
It goes under the hammer at Christie’s on Wednesday, something of an incongruous lot in the post-war and contemporary evening sale, which attracts the biggest spenders in the high-octane world of international billionaire art collectors.
The auction house, which declines to comment on the controversy and identifies the seller only as a European collector, has valued it at $100 million.
“Look at the painting, it is an extraordinary work of art,” said Francois de Poortere, head of the old master’s department at Christie’s. “That’s what we should focus on.”
But the price will be closely watched — not just as one of fewer than 20 paintings by Da Vinci’s hand accepted to exist, but by its owner Dmitry Rybolovlev, the boss of soccer club AS Monaco who is suing Swiss art dealer Yves Bouvier in the city-state.
Rybolovlev accuses Bouvier of conning him out of hundreds of million dollars in parting with an eye-watering $2.1 billion on 37 masterpieces. One of those works was “Salvator Mundi” which has been exhibited at The National Gallery in London.
Bouvier bought the Da Vinci at Sotheby’s for $80 million in 2013. He resold it to the Russian tycoon for $127.5 million.
The painting’s rarity is difficult to overstate. For years it was presumed to have been destroyed. In 1958, it fetched £45 and disappeared again for decades, emerging only in 2005 when it was purchased from a US estate.
It was long believed to have been a copy, before eventually being certified as authentic. All other known paintings by Da Vinci are held in museum or institutional collections.
“For auction specialists, this is pretty much the Holy Grail,” Loic Gouzer, co-chairman of Christie’s Americas post-war and contemporary art department, has said. “It doesn’t really get better than that.”
Christie’s has sought to emphasize Da Vinci’s inestimable contribution to art history by hanging “Salvator Mundi” next to Andy Warhol’s “Sixty Last Suppers” — which depicts Da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” 60 times over, also on sale with a $50 million estimate.
Pablo Picasso holds the world record for the most expensive piece of art ever sold at auction. His “The Women of Algiers (Version O)” fetched $179.4 million at Christie’s in New York in 2015.
Other highlights being offered by the auction house are “Contraste de formes,” a 1913 Fernand Leger valued at $65 million and “Laboureur dans un champ” by Van Gogh, painted from the window of a French asylum in 1889 valued at $50 million.
Sotheby’s, whose May sales languished behind Christie’s, says it has more than 60 works making their auction debuts this week.
Chief among them is Francis Bacon’s “Three Studies of George Dyer,” valued at $35-45 million, and which it says is appearing in public for the first time in 50 years.
Painted in 1966 during his passionate relationship with Dyer, two other such triptychs are in museums and two others have been offered at auction in recent years.
Sotheby’s other star lot is a 1972 Warhol “Mao,” exhibited in Berlin, Turin and Paris, and now back in public view for the first time since 1974. It has been given an estimate of $30-40 million.
Each of the other 10 “Mao” paintings of the same size are in prestigious public and private collections, including the Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh. Sotheby’s calls it one of the most iconic images of the 20th century.
But for the first time, the house has added a collector car to an art auction, offering Michael Schumacher’s Grand Prix-Winning Ferrari for upwards of $4million on Thursday. But is it a work of art?
“No, it’s not,” says Gregoire Billault, senior Sotheby’s vice president. “But it’s... the very best racing car ever sold at an auction.”
Controversial Da Vinci is New York auction season star
Controversial Da Vinci is New York auction season star
Irish performer ‘cries’ after Israel reaches Eurovision final as UK venues cancel watch parties
Bambie Thug, Ireland’s entry in the Eurovision Song Contest, claims to have cried after Israel qualified for the final to be held on Saturday.
“It is a complete overshadow of everything, goes against everything that Eurovision is meant to be,” Bambie Thug told journalists ahead of the event at Malmo Arena in Sweden. “I cried with my team.”
The 31-year-old singer and songwriter wore a keffiyeh and carried Irish flags while urging the European Broadcasting Union to show “conscience” and “humanity.”
The artist will perform “Doomsday Blue” in the final.
Israel’s performer, Eden Golan, will present her song “Hurricane” at the competition. The track underwent revisions after the initial version, “October Rain,” was deemed too political by the EBU.
Although the contest’s motto is “united by music,” this year’s event has attracted protests from Palestinians and their supporters, who say Israel should be excluded because of its conduct of the war in Gaza.
Thousands of people are expected to march for a second time this week through Sweden’s third-largest city, which has a large Muslim population, to demand a boycott of Israel and a ceasefire in the seven-month conflict.
In Finland, a group of about 40 protesters stormed the headquarters of public broadcaster YLE on Saturday, demanding it withdraw from the song contest because of Israel’s participation.
Venues across England are canceling their gigs after Palestine protest groups instructed their followers to pressure pubs showing the contest - leading some venues to close due to staff safety concerns.
The Duke of York cinema in Brighton called off its Eurovision event this week, telling ticket holders it was doing so “due to safety concerns for our staff and customers,” the Guardian reported. The Brighton Palestinian Solidarity Campaign called the decision a “massive win.”
AlUla to have starring role in ‘Motor City’ to be filmed in Saudi Arabia
DUBAI: Saudi Arabia’s AlUla is expected to have a starring role in director Potsy Ponciroli’s upcoming action thriller “Motor City.”
Production is due to start on July 10 in New Jersey and Saudi Arabia. The film is part of production company Stampede Ventures’ 10-picture slate deal with Film AlUla.
The cast will include Alan Ritchson, Shailene Woodley, Ben Foster and Pablo Schreiber.
“Motor City” is centered around John Miller (Ritchson), a Detroit auto worker who loses everything, including his girlfriend (Woodley), after being framed by a local gangster (Foster) and sent to prison.
After his release, Miller seeks revenge while trying to win his former girlfriend back.
Louvre Abu Dhabi to exhibit Van Gogh artwork
DUBAI: Louvre Abu Dhabi is set to display an artwork by Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh at the “Post-Impressionism: Beyond Appearances” exhibition running from Oct. 16 to Feb. 9 next year.
The work, “Bedroom in Arles,” depicts van Gogh’s bedroom in his yellow house in Arles, where he set up his studio and lived from September 1888.
The exhibition will be curated by Jean-Remi Touzet, conservator for paintings at the Musee d’Orsay, and Jerome Farigoule, chief curator at Louvre Abu Dhabi, with the support of Aisha Alahmadi, curatorial assistant at Louvre Abu Dhabi.
It will delve into the period known as post-impressionism, focusing specifically on the years between 1886 and 1905. “These two decades were a time of immense artistic innovation and experimentation, marking the transition from impressionism to the explosive emergence of the ‘fauves’ at the Salon d’Automne,” a press release said.
Highlights from the Arab world include two masterpieces by French Egyptian artist Georges Hanna Sabbagh: “The artist and his family at La Clarte” (1920) and “The Sabbaghs in Paris” (1921).
Singer Elyanna makes her TV debut on ‘The Late Show’
- Chilean Palestinian star performs hits from debut ‘Woledto’
- Proudly adorned with Palestinian keffiyeh around her head
DUBAI: Chilean Palestinian singer Elyanna made her television debut this week on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”
The 22-year-old music sensation delivered a medley of hits from her debut album “Woledto,” including “Callin’ U (Tamally Maak)” and “Mama Eh,” the first song performed entirely in Arabic on the show.
Her performance featured an ensemble of oud, tabla, riq and dancers.
“I had so much fun performing on this iconic stage,” she wrote to her 1.2 million followers after her show.
The hitmaker was adorned in a white lace dress featuring two thigh-high slits. She complemented the attire with coin-belt accessories, draping them over her shoulders and fastening them around her calves to add a Middle Eastern touch to her look.
In one of the pictures she shared with her fans, she proudly wore the Palestinian keffiyeh around her head as she posed in front of “The Late Show” desk.
Elyanna dropped her album in April. It features nine songs: “Woledto,” “Ganeni,” “Calling U,” “Al Sham,” “Mama Eh,” “Kon Nafsak,” “Lel Ya Lel,” “Yabn El Eh” and “Sad in Pali.”
Before releasing the album, she wrote to her Instagram followers: “This album is the embodiment of pride to be an Arab woman, to be from Nazareth, to be from the Middle East.”
“This is the closest I’ve been to where I come from,” she added. “The only feature on my album is my grandfather.”
The Los Angeles-based singer’s music is a mix of Arabic and Western beats, which she attributes to her multicultural upbringing.
Elyanna has been normalizing Arabic lyrics in the Western world throughout her career, taking inspiration from artists including Lana Del Ray and Beyonce, as well as Middle Eastern legend Fayrouz.
In 2023, Elyanna became the first artist to perform a full set in Arabic at California’s Coachella music festival.
She embarked on a North American Tour this year, gracing stages in Dallas, Houston, Toronto, Montreal, Washington, New York, Chicago, Detroit, San Francisco and Santa Ana.
REVIEW: ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ a worthy addition to successful franchise
DUBAI: When soulless, cookie-cutter franchises were but the norm, the “Planet of the Apes” reboot trilogy — starring Andy Serkis’s commanding Ceasar — cut through the noise to offer a textured, resonant story that not only did well with the critics but also broke box office records.
Coming seven years after the final instalment of that trilogy, “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” continues the legacy with a visually rich and emotionally layered story. It takes its inspiration from the original 1968 film, “Planet of the Apes,” which was in itself an adaptation of French author Pierre Boulle’s 1963 novel “La Planete des singes.”
Director Wes Ball (“The Maze Runner” trilogy) continues his run of dystopian features, but this time explores it in a lush, Garden of Eden-adjacent setting.
“Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” is set generations after Ceasar’s time, when the world has been taken over by intelligent apes. The same virus that evolved them has regressed humans into an echo of their former selves, rendering them primitive and without language.
A coming-of-age story, our protagonist is the young simian Noa (a poignant and scene-stealing Owen Teague). When his clan is murdered by a rival group of bloodthirsty apes, Noa goes on the adventure of his life as he sets out to save those he can from the tyrannical rule of Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand). On his journey, he teams up with a human girl May (“The Witcher” star Freya Allan) and a wise orangutan named Raka (Peter Macon), who still live by the words of the original Caesar.
While the premise itself lacks the depth of the previous trilogy, Ball compensates through extensive character work. He poses thought-provoking questions about whether humanity deserves a second chance, whether the apes will continue to make the same mistakes humans did, and whether apes and humans can imagine a future of peaceful co-existence.
The action and emotions are supported by groundbreaking visuals that seamlessly blend convincing motion-capture performances with beautifully rendered CGI.
To sum up, “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” proves a more than worthy successor to a franchise that refuses to quit — and for good reason.
