A large Claude Monet painting of flowers in his Giverny water garden sold for 50 million euros (about $56 million) at Sotheby’s in Paris on Thursday.
After a 42-minute bidding tussle between at least six would-be buyers on telephones, the painting, titled “Iris,” was bought by an Asian client bidding by phone with Jen Hua, deputy chairman of Sotheby’s Asia.
“I’ve never seen bidding that long,” said Helly Nahmad, a London dealer who specializes in modern art.
“It was insane,” he added, “but these things are mega-rare.”
The world record for a Monet painting is $110.7 million, set in 2019 at Sotheby’s with the sale of the 1890 painting “Meules,” or “Grainstacks.” (The price would be $145.7 million today, adjusted for inflation.)
“Iris,” which is about 5 feet tall and nearly 6 feet wide, depicts flowers swaying above skies reflected in Monet’s famous lily pond. Experts think the canvas was painted in the open air in 1924-25, toward the end of the artist’s life. It had been estimated to sell for between €20 million to €30 million.
Until recently, owners of high-value artworks routinely consigned their trophies to auctions in either New York or London. But since Brexit has made Britain a less attractive destination for art sales, European collectors have been more willing to sell in Paris.
In March, Alon Zakaim, a London dealer, offered a rare pair of Monet “series” landscape paintings from the 1890s at TEFAF Maastricht, in the Netherlands, with an asking price of $20 million. They found a buyer after the fair.
“It was a pretty painting with a modern look that attracts new buyers,” Zakaim said of the painting sold on Thursday. “It relates well to later 20th-century works,” he added. “The appetite for these large, late Monet paintings is increasing.”
“Iris” had been in the collection of Jeanne Schlumberger, an heiress to the Schlumberger energy company, now known as SLB. During the 1950s and ’60s, with the help of the pioneering Paris dealer Katia Granoff, Schlumberger amassed an extensive collection of Impressionist and modern art, including late paintings by Monet, which were then out of fashion, according to Sotheby’s.
“Iris” was among about 50 Monets that Granoff bought from the artist’s son Michel in 1956. Schlumberger acquired it the following year.
“Once the painting arrived in her house, it left the world,” Thomas Bompard, a senior international specialist at Sotheby’s Paris, said in an interview before the auction. He said the painting had “never been exhibited.”
Schlumberger died in 1983, and her descendants have chosen the 100th anniversary of Monet’s death to sell “Iris” and 26 other works from her collection at Sotheby’s.
Cyrille de Gunzburg, a private dealer in Paris, said in an interview at the Sotheby’s pre-auction view that he had negotiated the sale of a Monet from a similar date for $15 million in 2013.
“Art history tells us that Cézanne was the big influence on Modern art,” he said. “Paintings like this show it was also Monet.”
In recent years, as Monet’s influence on Abstract Expressionism and other 20th-century art movements has been more widely appreciated, wealthy collectors have coveted the artist’s late works.
“This painting could be benchmarked against the great Monets in the museums of Paris,” said Helena Newman, Sotheby’s worldwide chairman of Impressionist & Modern art. “It was a true museum quality work.”
Overall, the Schlumberger collection raised €74.4 million, or about $83.5 million.
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