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Between €22 and 30 million, the highest estimate ever placed on a painting sold in France. That is what a buyer could spend to obtain ‘Iris’ by Claude Monet.
On 22 October, Sotheby’s auction house will be offering the rarely seen work by the French Renaissance master for sale, alongside other works from the Schlumberger family’s private collection.
A monumental painting created by Monet at the end of his life, the canvas is, according to curators, in remarkable condition. _”_It has no varnish, it is on its original canvas and has never been restored. They are exactly as Monet painted them 100 years ago,” explains Thomas Bompard, co-director of the Modern and Contemporary Department at Sotheby’s France.
Canvases preserved in the Schlumberger living room
Every detail counts. Varnish alters the chromatic tones of a painting, according to art historian Marianne Mathieu.
But restoration could damage the texture of the paint on the canvas. “Late Monet is a Monet who works the material. So to truly discover and understand him, that material has to be preserved. And we still have these thick impastos.”
Hung in a Schlumberger family sitting room for a century, ‘Iris’, like ‘Weeping Willow’, also up for sale and valued at between nine and ten million euros, has never been moved.
Above all, it has never been seen in colour by the general public. It was acquired by Jeanne Schlumberger (1889-1983), “a brilliant art collector”, from the painter’s family through “the visionary gallerist” Katia Granoff, according to Thomas Bompard, without going through an auction room.
“Many people knew the story, or at least knew of the existence of this collection; people whispered that these were the finest Monets in Paris, but very few had actually seen them. That is also what is fuelling today’s excitement,” he notes.
A collection valued at €40 million
Another factor that has pushed prices higher is the centenary of the death of the Impressionist artist, who died on 5 December 1926. Two exhibitions on the painter’s life open in Paris at the end of September: “Monet, Painting Time” and “Stories of Landscapes, from Monet to Hockney”.
In all, 28 works are up for auction at Sotheby’s, in a sale expected to raise more than €40 million. Among them are four Monets, as well as a sculpture by Camille Claudel and several paintings by Gustave Moreau.
Also being sold on this occasion is a wall composition of three works by Paul Cézanne. “La Ferme”, the central painting, is “the largest work by the artist ever to be offered at auction” and is estimated at between €600,000 and €800,000.
The three paintings have been designated as “national treasures”, a measure intended to give the state 30 months in which to arrange a possible acquisition.