After four minutes, the bidding broadcast via livestream was over. Sandro Botticelli’s “Portrait of a Young Man with a Medallion” was auctioned yesterday at Sotheby’s in New York for $ 80 million. The anonymous buyer made his bid by phone to the Sotheby’s lady with the 45 action paddle. With fees, the total is $ 92.2 million. The amount achieved is the second highest that has ever been paid for a painting by an old master at auction – after the 450.3 million dollars for da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi”.
The “Portrait of a Young Man with a Medallion”, created between 1480 and 1485, is one of only twelve surviving portraits from the hand of the Florentine master. Sandro Botticelli (1445– 1510) was one of the greatest artists – not only of the Renaissance founded in Florence, but of European art history. The artist, known as “Botticelli” (Italian for “little keg”) because of his corpulent stature – actually Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi – painted the masterpieces “The Birth of Venus” and “The Spring”, among others.
His now auctioned “Young Man …” is imbued with the Florentine spirit of the 15th century. The elegant young man is shown in an aristocratic manner with half-length hair and dark blue clothes. This underlines his elevated position in society. The medallion showing a bearded saint giving a blessing is to be interpreted as a profession of faith. It is still unclear who the portrait actually shows. It is possible that it is Giovanni di Pierfrancesco de ‘Medici, whose older brother Lorenzo was a patron of Botticelli. The “Portrait of a Young Man with a Medallion” was unknown for centuries and hung in the castle of the Newborough family in Wales. The noble Sir Thomas Wynn, an ancestor of the family, acquired the painting in Tuscany in the 18th century.
It was not until the 1930s that the work became famous among art connoisseurs. In 1935 it went under the hammer in London for the first time, sold to a private collector. In 1982 it was auctioned by his heirs for 912,000 euros. In the past few decades the work has been shown in the National Gallery in London, in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art and in the Städel Museum in Frankfurt.
Article by
Lukas Luger
Culture editor
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