Feb

10

A Paul Gauguin painting of two Tahitian girls has smashed the record for the world's most expensive single work of art, after Qatar bought the canvas from a Swiss collector for almost $300 million (£200m).


Experts said that the sale could be the start of a new trend of trophy sales that bypass auction houses in favour of lucrative direct deals.

"£200m Gauguin becomes most expensive work of art of all time"

Henry Huntington, who made his own "big" money from the Uber of its day, set the record for an art purchase by buying Gainsborough's The Blue Boy for $728,800 in 1921. In the legal tender of the time (1 oz pure gold = $20.67), that was 35,258.8 ounces of the evil metal, which would be worth $43,434,714.

That may not be the correct adjustment to make if one wants to compare prices then and prices now. M2 in 1921 was 32.85 billion; Huntington's check represented 1 out of every 45,074 dollars outstanding in currency in coin. M2 right now is 11,714.1 billion. Qatar's check for $288 million represents 1 out of every 40,674 dollars presently outstanding.


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  1. anand on February 10, 2015 9:59 am

    buying things like paintings for astronomical sums makes me laugh .. I live near the national gallery & portrait gallery in London and often walk through them to take a look at the art, as well as to try and chat up attractive arty types on holiday .. some are quite nice to look at (the paintings I mean) but are of limited interest. for example if you look at a Canaletto scene of venice .. its curious, but you could hop on a plane one weekend and actually go see the real place these days for £200 (albeit todays Venice not 250 years ago so there is some historical value). I guess my point is that real life is better than some 2D representation on oil and canvas. I can only imagine hedge fund managers and the worlds kleptocracy indulge in this hobby of fine art collecting to impress upon others how refined their tastes have become since they came into their money.

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