Sandro Botticelli’s painting, “Man of Sorrows,” was sold last month at a Sotheby’s old master’s auction for $45.4 million, making it the second most expensive work by the painter to be sold at an auction.
A total of three phone bidders joined the seven-minute battle for the 500-year-old painting at the live-streamed Master Paintings Part I auction held at Sotheby’s.
Two final bidders, represented by Sotheby’s senior Old Master specialists Christopher Apostle and Liz Lobkowicz, vied for the painting, bringing the hammer price up to $39.3 million, in line with its presale estimate of $40 million.
The price for the masterpiece surpassed the Italian Renaissance artist’s previous second-highest auction set for “The Rockefeller Madonna,” which sold for $10.4 million at Christie’s in 2013.
In January 2021, Sotheby’s sold Botticelli’s “Portrait of a Young Man Holding a Roundel” for $92.2 million to a Russian bidder, an event credited for providing a boost to the market for Old Master paintings.
The sale of “Man of Sorrows” has done the same, making a shift among auction houses that have been focusing on blue-chip sales of old-world trophies.
Botticelli’s recently sold masterpiece depicts a bust-length portrait portraying Jesus Christ, wearing a crown made of thorns on the head and surrounded with flying angels that form his halo. Christ is set against a dark background with his long, flowing hair in a pleated, crimson robe.
His hands are strained with ropes, and he appears to be injured. His gaze is both serene as well as sorrowful.
“Clothed in billowing fabrics, their graceful figures contrast markedly with the crown of long, sharp, blue-green thorns. All but one angel shield their grief-stricken faces from the sight before them, as they hold the Arma Christi or the instruments of Christ’s Passion that symbolize his death and suffering,” described the auction house.
The painter entered his final years of life in late 15th century and the early 16th century. His faith grew stronger, which inspired him to create religious portraits. His last pieces are a far cry form his earlier secular works with mythology scenes and Italian noblemen.
“Man of Sorrows” was created at a time when Botticelli was greatly influenced by the fanatical Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola. The result? It is a realistic depiction of Christ that perfectly captures his divinity.
Botticelli’s paintings, including the “Madonna and Child,” “The Birth of Venus,” and “Primavera,” rarely ever appear on the auction market. Only a few are still in private hands.
The “Man of Sorrows” has been sold from a private American collection and had not changed hands since it last appeared at a 1963 auction, when it sold for $28,000.
Art historian Federico Zeri verified the painting’s authenticity as a work by Botticelli when the portrait was sold almost half a century ago. It has only been displayed in public once, in 2009, during a special exhibition at the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, Germany.
“Botticelli’s Man of Sorrows is one of the most potent, humbling works I have ever encountered,” said Christopher Apostle, the head of Sotheby’s Old Masters painting department, after the work’s sale.
“Although seemingly religious, it’s a painting of enormous humanity—a portrait of human suffering and spirituality that speaks a universal language. Today’s result is not only testament to its power and importance, but also to the timelessness of works painted some 500 years ago.”
Congratulations to the lucky buyer of this rare masterpiece!
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