Impressionist artist Claude Monet is a regular at major modern art sales held by the auction market’s leaders. Represented at the Sotheby's evening sale on 12 May, and again at Christie's 20th Century Evening Sale on 13 May, the painter did wonders once again. The two paintings will be able to join the ranks of the Monet’s top 10 most expensive works ever sold at auction.
Sotheby's New York opened the sale with the monumental canvas (100 x 200 cm) Le Bassin aux nymphéas (Water Lilies Basin), painted around 1918 and bearing the artist's signature. The auction house described it as a "holy grail for a collector". The work sold for $77.4 million (£49.52 mil) and now occupies fifth place on the list of Monet's most expensive paintings.
See also: The 12 Most Expensive Paintings Ever Auctioned
The next day, still in New York, Christie's put up the highly anticipated Pont de Waterloo, effet de brouillard (Waterloo Bridge, fog effect), a painting from the London series executed between 1899 and 1903. It reached $48.5 million (£34.14 mil), the second highest bid of the evening behind only Picasso's Femme assise près d'une fenêtre (Marie-Thérèse) (Woman Sitting by a Window, Marie-Thérèse).
"We were especially lucky to have Monet’s Waterloo Bridge, effet de brouillard in the sale, which achieved the highest price for the London Series." said Vanessa Fusco, Co-Head of the 20th Century Evening Sale at Christie's.
Claude Monet had visited London on many occasions in 1899 and 1900, capturing the Waterloo Bridge and the Houses of Parliament several times from his hotel room or outdoors.
Waterloo Bridge, effet de brouillard now occupies seventh place in the artist's top 10 most expensive works, a list dominated by representations of water lilies and haystacks.
