PARIS — A vividly hued Picasso portrait of longtime muse and partner Dora Maar that had remained hidden from public view for more than eight decades sold Friday at auction for 32 million euros (about $37 million), including fees — surpassing expectations but far from the artist's most expensive work ever auctioned.
Painted in July 1943, "Bust of a Woman with a Flowered Hat (Dora Maar)" depicts Maar in a brightly colored floral hat. Maar, an artist and photographer herself, had been Picasso's partner and muse for about seven years, and the relationship was coming to a painful close. The work was purchased in 1944 and had not been on the market since, remaining in the family collection.
The painting, part of Picasso's "Woman in a Hat" series, was auctioned at the Drouot auction house in Paris. Auctioneer Christophe Lucien called the final sale, to a buyer in the room, "an enormous success," as well as a very emotional moment. He said the price — 32,012,397 euros after adding buyer fees to the 27-million hammer price — was not only well above estimates but also the highest paid at auction this year for any artwork in France.
Lucien called the painting "a little piece of the story of love" — albeit a bittersweet one — between Picasso and Maar. She was 29 when she met the artist and quickly became his muse and the model for "Guernica," among other works. He later left her for the younger Francoise Gilot and she died at 89, having lived an increasingly reclusive life.
Theirs "was not a very simple story," Lucien said, adding that the painting came at the end of it. "You see that she was containing tears because she understood that Picasso was leaving her."
At a preview this week, Picasso specialist Agnès Sevestre-Barbé marveled at how vivid the portrait has remained.
"We have a painting that is exactly as it was when it left the studio," she said. "It wasn't varnished, which means we have all its raw material, all of it. It's a painting where you can feel all the colors, the entire chromatic range."
"It's a painting that speaks for itself," she added. "You just have to look at it — it's full of expression, and you can see all of Picasso's genius."
Previously, Sevestre-Barbé noted, the work had only been seen in a black-and-white photograph. "We couldn't imagine from this photo that this painting was so colorful, so amazing, really."
Auctioneer Lucien said before the sale that the work was of huge interest across the globe.
"It's being talked about in all the world capitals with a strong art market, from the United States to Asia, and of course through all the major European markets," he said.
Though selling above expectations, the work was far from the most expensive Picasso work sold at auction. In 2023, the artist's famed "Femme à la montre" ("Woman with a Watch") — portraying another muse, Marie-Thérèse Walter — sold for $139.4 million, the second most valuable Picasso sold at auction. The most valuable was $179.4 million, paid in 2015 for a version of "Les Femmes d'Alger" ("Women of Algiers").
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