Picasso sold for 139.4 million USD at auction

Despite the recent generally disappointing auction results of major houses, a major sensation can be announced: The painting Femme à la montre (1932) by Pablo Picasso realized the sum of 139.4 million USD. The auction took place on November 8 at Sotheby's auction house in New York, which had estimated the painting at around 120 million US dollars. It is the second most expensive work by Picasso of all time, not including private sales. The most expensive is Les femmes d'Alger (version 'O') (1955), which was sold at Christie's in 2015 for more than 179 million USD.

Femme à la montre comes from the collection of Emily Fisher Landau, who died in March. It is a portrait of Picasso's beloved Marie-Thérèse Walter. Landau bought it in 1968, as Sotheby's explained. The buyer is not yet known.