The Economist identifies the buyer of this record-setting Monet from two years ago in its report on last week’s Impressionist and Modern sales in London. Once again, the magazine’s report contains some curious comments that would limit confidence that the identified buyer was really Tanya Buckrell Pos’s client:
Christie’s also faced difficulties the following night with one of its star lots, Claude Monet’s “Nymphéas”, dating from 1906. Encouraged by the record £40.9m that Andrey Melnichenko, a young Russian tycoon, paid exactly two years earlier for another, later work from the same series, Christie’s set the estimate at £30m-40m. This, despite the fact that the earlier painting had been twice as long, more colourful and in far better condition. “The consignor just got greedy,” one dealer said afterwards. Four buyers expressed interest in the painting. The auctioneer opened the bidding at £22m, but no one would go beyond £29m, so the painting was returned to the seller. This failure will taint its prospects, probably for at least a decade.
The unidentified dealer was, of course, Richard Feigen, who was all too happy to be identified on Bloomberg expressing the sentiment.
More Sense Than Money (The Economist)