Portugal’s Disputed Miró Collection Gets an Unsolicited Bid

Agence France Presse reports that a flamboyant Angolan entrepreneur has offered to buy the disputed Miró collection being sold by the government:

An Angolan-born Hollywood movie financier has reportedly offered to buy 85 paintings by Catalan artist Joan Miro from the cash-strapped Portuguese government.

Rui Costa Reis, 46-year-old Angolan-born son of Portuguese emigrants who made his fortune in cereals and expanded into the movie business, has offered 44 million euros ($60 million) for the collection owned by the Portuguese state, the Diario business daily said.

The entrepreneur promised to place the Spanish artists’ works on exhibition for 50 years in the northern Portuguese port city of Porto, his mother’s birthplace, the paper said.

The Portuguese government did not offer an immediate reaction to the report.

Angolan movie financier Rui Costa Reis bids for 85 works by Joan Miro (AFP)