Andy Warhol’s famous 1960s painting ‘White Disaster’ was sold for $85 million at auction recently at Sotheby’s in New York.
The 1963 piece of art was sold for a total of $74 million, or $85,350,500 with all related costs and fees.
Two minutes and a brief duel between two representatives of the auction house who took their orders over the phone in New York, was all it took for this monumental and emblematic painting to be bought.
The work, White Disaster, which represents nineteen times in black and white the same image of a macabre car accident, remains far from the record of the American artist, as his portrait of Marilyn Monroe, “Shot Sage Blue Marylin” from 1962 was auctioned in May for $195 million, becoming the most expensive 20th-century work ever sold at auction.
The canvas is a work of silkscreen ink and graphite, and it represents nineteen times in black and white the same image of a macabre car accident, with a scene sometimes dazzled, as if by the light of a flash. It is 3.60 meters high (12 feet tall).
No information was disclosed about the buyer
Andy Warhol, the visual artist, and master of pop arts became a star of the auction, and the last time a piece of art from his ‘Death and Disaster’ series was sold in 2013, it set a record for the artist at $105 million.
It was stated that Warhol’s painting of Marilyn Monroe, was what begins his fascination with celebrity imagery, but in reality, it was really her demise at the end of 1962 and the spectacle around her death that captured his fascination.
Only three works from the White Disaster series, exist in this monumental format (12 feet tall), one of which is at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.
The piece sold recently came from a private collection and Sotheby’s gave no information on the buyer.
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