Auction house Christie's set to sell artwork from the Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art, featuring a Monet painting valued at $40 million.
In a significant move, works from one of Japan's foremost collections of Western art will be auctioned off by Christie's. The collection, owned by the DIC Corporation and housed in the Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art located in Sakura, 25 miles northeast of Tokyo, includes pieces by renowned artists such as Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Marc Chagall, Henri Matisse, and Henry Moore.
The auction, scheduled for November, will feature notable works like Monet's oil painting Nymphéas (1907), which has a low estimate of $40 million. Renoir's Baigneuse (1891), a celebrated depiction of one of Renoir's favourite subjects, the female nude, will also be part of the sale.
From Chagall's oeuvre, Le songe du Roi David (1966) and Le soleil rouge (1949) will be auctioned. Le songe du Roi David is a monumental, vibrantly colored work, while Le soleil rouge offers a poetic vision of romantic love.
The museum's board of directors announced a decision to "downsize and relocate" the institution, including the sale of 25 percent of its artworks. This decision has sparked controversy, with Hong Kong-based activist fund Oasis Management criticising the move as "highly inappropriate" in April.
Yusaku Maezawa, a Japanese billionaire and art collector, has expressed hope that Japanese buyers would be approached first before the artworks are sold. Maezawa, who stated that Japanese people need to protect Japan's traditional things, including art, for future generations, sees this auction as an opportunity to keep these valuable pieces within the country.
The artworks to be sold are valued at $77.5 million. The sales of these works are expected to generate at least ¥10 billion [over $63 million] in cash inflow in fiscal year 2025.
Christie's calls the consignment a 'rare opportunity' for 'distinguished collectors' to acquire these works from one of Japan's most esteemed collections of Western art. The auction is set to take place in November, with Nymphéas, Le songe du Roi David, Le soleil rouge, and Baigneuse included in Christie's 20th Century Evening Sale.
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