Titian Madonna and Child sells for record $16.9m
A 450-year-old Madonna and Child work by Titian has sold for $16.9m (£10.7m) in New York, setting a new auction record for the Renaissance master.
A Sacra Conversazione: The Madonna and Child with Saints Luke and Catherine of Alexandria was sold at Sotheby's to a European telephone bidder.
It beat the previous Titian auction record of £7.5m ($11.9m) paid at Christie's in London in December 1991.
That was the price achieved for the artist's Venus and Adonis painting.
A spokeswoman for Sotheby's said A Sacra Conversazione was "one of only a handful of multi-figured compositions by Titian that remain in private hands".
It was also, she added, "the most important to appear at auction in decades".
Sotheby's said the oil on canvas work - painted around 1560 - had changed hands only six times during its life....
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A Sacra Conversazione: The Madonna and Child with Saints Luke and Catherine of Alexandria was sold at Sotheby's to a European telephone bidder.
It beat the previous Titian auction record of £7.5m ($11.9m) paid at Christie's in London in December 1991.
That was the price achieved for the artist's Venus and Adonis painting.
A spokeswoman for Sotheby's said A Sacra Conversazione was "one of only a handful of multi-figured compositions by Titian that remain in private hands".
It was also, she added, "the most important to appear at auction in decades".
Sotheby's said the oil on canvas work - painted around 1560 - had changed hands only six times during its life....