Art Market Monitor

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Daily Mail Says Regional Rivalry Drove Leonardo Bidding

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File this under stories too good to check. Update: And Christie’s has officially poured cold water on it, calling the story “pure fantasy” (adding that no bidder can directly or indirectly bid against himself in a sale.)

Once the information came out that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was behind the $450m purchase of Leonardo’s Salvator Mundi at Christie’s last Fall, the immediate question running through the art world was, “who was the underbidder?”

The Daily Mail now claims it was the UAE’s ruler, Mohammed bin Zayed on the other side. Each Gulf potentate had sent a proxy to the auction with instructions not to lose out to their rivals in Qatar whom both assumed would be the other bidder:

‘The bidding started to get high, and each of them thought they were bidding against the Qataris, and didn’t want them to get it,’ said one source close to the Emirati leader.

‘So they gave their proxies instructions, saying ‘you can go as high as you want, just make sure you get it’.

‘It got to $450 million and the Emiratis gave up. Then s**t hit the fan when the record came out.

‘MBZ [Mohammed Bin Zayed] told Salman: “That was us bidding for it, why didn’t you tell me?”‘

Two Arab princes in $450m bidding war for Da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi | (Daily Mail Online)

Yes, It’s a Leonardo. Stop Calling It a Fake.

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What’s it the kids say on the internet? Oh, right. James Tarmy demolishes Jerry Saltz and the rest of the Leonardo authenticity doubters with his tour d’horizon of Old Master dealers.

Whatever one thinks about the sale of the Salvator Mundi, there’s a remarkable consensus on the work’s attribution that should have long ago banished the phrase “questions of authenticity” from any report that wants to be taken seriously:

“All of the most relevant people believe it’s by Leonardo, so the rather extensive criticism that goes ‘I don’t know anything about old masters, but I don’t think it’s by Leonardo’ shouldn’t ever have gone to print,” says British old masters dealer Charles Beddington. “Yes, it’s a picture that needed to be extensively restored. But the fact that it’s unanimously accepted as a Leonardo shows it’s in good enough condition that there weren’t questions of authenticity.”

Is the $450 Million Leonardo da Vinci Painting a Fake? (Bloomberg)

Is the Leonardo Record a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy for Salvator Mundi’s Fame?

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Integral to Christie’s pitch for the Leonardo Salvator Mundi‘s appeal is that the painting will anchor a future institution the way the Mona Lisa is the main attraction at Paris’s Louvre museum. In the days before the sale, a chorus of frustrated voices grew louder expressing their doubts about the painting’s restoration and even questioning the scholarly consensus that emerged before the 2011 Leonardo show at the UK’s National Gallery. Central to some of those objections are whether the painting is of sufficient quality to justify the price paid (It’s worth pausing here to remind everyone that the art market doesn’t measure quality, it measures demand and distribution) or whether the damage the painting has suffered over so many years has compromised the work.

In either case, we might want to look back at the Mona Lisa and its rise to fame for clues about the record setting $450m purchase. In other words, is the painting worth it? Continue Reading

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