Giacometti's Nihilist Monument Shatters Art Auction Record
PROOF YOU CAN HAVE TOO MUCH MONEY
Giacometti's Nihilist Monument Shatters Art Auction Record
THE TALL, GAUNT "WALKING MAN" was conceived as part of a series of bronze figures commissioned to stand outside the Chase Manhattan Bank in New York City's financial district.
Fifty years later, the haunted-looking figure sculpted by Swiss artist Giovanni Giacometti has sold for $104.3 million dollars, the highest sum ever paid for a work of art at auction.
The highest price previously paid was $104.2 set in 2004 for Pablo Picasso's 1906 portrait Boy With a Pipe.
The 6-foot-high piece, auctioned off at Sotheby's in London on Wednesday, was originally expected to fetch only a quarter of what became the final tally. But the price was propelled northward by competition between two anonymous and fiercely determined collectors.
"Above $50 million, the fight for any artwork goes from love to a grudge match," New York art dealer Marc Glimcher told the Wall Street Journal.
It's ironic that an individual in pursuit of possession could squander $104.3 million on a piece of bronze that, at least to philosopher William Barrett, personifies the view "that modern life is increasingly devoid of meaning and empty."
Congratulations to the new owner, for whom we hope the new possession fills his soul.
