Leonardo da Vinci‘s last privately owned painting, Salvator Mundi, is expected to sell at auction next month and the estimated price is fucking eye watering.
The picture of Jesus was thought to have been painted by a da Vinci follower and as such, was worth fuck all. In 1958, the painting sold for just 60 bucks at a Christie’s auction. In 2007, a conservator named Dianne Dwyer Modestini was suss on the work and removed some layers of paint that were added to it, revealing it to be an actual original by the famous artist
The painting has since been in private ownership, but is set to be auctioned on November 15. It’s estimated the 500-year-old work could attract bids of over $100 million due to its rarity. Fucking hell.
There’s less than 20 known original da Vinci paintings floating around the world and Christie’s reckons this is one of them. In case you were wondering, Salvator Mundi translates to “saviour of the world”.
Old mate painted the picture of Jeebus around 1500 A.D., around the same time he completed his most famous work, The Mona Lisa. Christie’s even went as far as to say its restoration is “the greatest artistic rediscovery of the 21st century.”
King Charles I of England even held onto the painting for a little bit, followed by his son, Charles II in the 17th century. History, bitch. Where it was between 1763 and 1900 is a little hazy, but I’d wager it was sitting in a dank dungeon for at least some of it.
So if you’ve got a spare $100 mil and a desire to own some famous as fuck art, get into it I reckon.
