Baptized the Raptor, the skeleton of a Deinonychus antirrhopus, made up of 126 fossilized bones and measuring more than three meters long, was sold for 12.4 million dollars (11.9 million euros), costs included, at an Asian customer, said the auction house after the sale, without further details.
This is the second highest price for such a relic, however far behind a specimen of the big star, the Tyrannosaurus Rex, which left in 2020 for 31.8 million dollars (30.5 million euros).
In good condition, the Raptor, which was enthroned at the entrance to Christie’s headquarters in Manhattan, was presented as the most complete for this species. It was discovered several years ago in Wolf Canyon, Montana, and has been in private hands ever since.
Scientific freedoms
Smaller than the T-Rex, more agile too, the Deinonychus antirrhopus inspired the Velociraptor of Steven Spielberg’s film “Jurassic Park” (1993). In reality, they are two different species, but the writers had taken some liberties with scientific truth.
Sales of dinosaur skeletons now regularly enliven the auctions, such as “Big John”, an eight-meter-long triceratops skeleton sold for 6.6 million euros to an American private individual, in October 2020. Even if it means frustrating the paleontologists who go there see one less chance of exhibiting them in museums.
This sale ended a more traditional evening, marked in particular by a record for Edgar Degas (1834-1917), whose sculpture, “Little dancer aged fourteen”, was sold for 41.6 million dollars (39.9 million euros), the highest ever at auction for the French artist.
This delicate bronze with a brown patina, which depicts a young ballerina with realism and detail, is not the original exhibited at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, but one of the proofs executed ten years after the death of the French impressionist by the founder Adrien-Aurélien Hébrard.
Well decorated apartment
The sculpture was one of twelve pieces in the collection of Anne Bass, an American businesswoman and patron who died in 2020, who was also the wife of billionaire and heir to an oil empire in Texas, Sid Bass.
During his lifetime, all the works were exhibited in his luxurious apartment on 5th Avenue in Manhattan: among them, two paintings by the American expressionist Marc Rothko (1903-1970), one of which “Untitled (Shades of red)” left at 66.8 million dollars (64.1 million euros), and three paintings by Claude Monet (1840-1926). His “Parliament, setting sun”, an oil on canvas both dark and luminous, was sold for 75.96 million dollars (72.93 million euros). In total, the twelve works brought in 363 million dollars (348.5 million euros).
Another record, as part of a sale devoted to the 20th century, with a “Head of a Woman (Fernande)” by Pablo Picasso, which has become the most expensive bronze by the Spanish artist ever sold at auction, at 48.48 million. dollars (46.55 million euros). This piece was sold by the Metropolitan Museum in New York, which received another model of this sculpture as a donation.
Among the highlights of the evening was a painting by African American Ernie Barnes (1938-2009), who was an artist after playing American football. His “Sugar Shack”, an acrylic on canvas, was estimated between 150,000 and 200,000 dollars by Christie’s but it flew away at 15.2 million dollars (14.9 million euros), after a long battle of ten minutes which involved 22 buyers. It capped at auction at $550,000.
Finally, an American painter of the 19th century, Emanuel Leutze, increased his record tenfold with a fresco, “Washington crossing the Delaware”, sold for 45 million dollars (43.21 million euros). Total sales for the evening: 831 million dollars (797.9 million euros).
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