LONDON — A tiny Leonardo da Vinci sketch sold on Thursday at Christie’s for £8.9 million with fees, or about $12.2 million, a record price for a Leonardo drawing at auction. Estimated to sell for £8 million to £12 million, or $11 million to $16.5 million, the drawing was bought by a single bid from an as-yet-unidentified buyer in the auction room. The final price of $12.2 million was marginally better than the $11.5 million given in 2001 for Leonardo’s slightly larger silverpoint study “Horse and rider,” the previous auction high for a drawing by the artist. “These prices are absurd,” said Jean-Luc Baroni, a dealer in museum-quality old master drawings, based in London and Paris. Baroni said that if he had been asked to price the work, he would have valued it at about $2 million.

Source: New York Times July 08, 2021 18:53 UTC