A painting by Russian modernist Wassily Kandinsky, once owned by victims of the Nazi Holocaust, has sold at Sotheby’s in London for £37.2 million ($44.55 million).
This became a new auction record for the artist.
The previous world record for Kandinsky’s work was set in 2016 when his painting “Rigide et Courbé” sold for $23.3 million at Christie’s in New York.
“Kandinsky’s Murnau period defined abstract art for generations to come,” Helena Newman, Sotheby’s European Chair and Head of Impressionism and Contemporary Art, said in a statement.
Kandinsky was living with his lover Gabriele Münter and artist friends in Murnau, Bavaria, when he painted “Murnau with Kirche II”, inspired by the local scenery while cycling. Munter herself made the inscription on the stretcher of the picture.