Central and South Americas
not including Fontana.
Except otherwise stated, all results include the premium.
See also : Mexico Women artists Self portrait Self portrait II Man and woman Sport Sport II Textiles Stamps
Chronology : 1850-1859 1923 1931 1933 1940-1949 1943 1945 1949 1992
Except otherwise stated, all results include the premium.
See also : Mexico Women artists Self portrait Self portrait II Man and woman Sport Sport II Textiles Stamps
Chronology : 1850-1859 1923 1931 1933 1940-1949 1943 1945 1949 1992
1856 British Guiana One Cent Magenta Stamp
2014 SOLD for $ 9.5M by Sotheby's
The invention of the postage stamp in England in 1840 is a revolution in communications. Hitherto limited to shipment operations, the Post Office of British Guiana is one of the first in South America to use stamps and to develop a local delivery, through the diligence of Edward Dalton, a colonial postmaster unwilling to wait for official authorizations.
The first stamps issued by the British Guiana in 1850 are made in black ink by woodcut printing on papers of various colors depending on the face value. The work is done by the printer of the local newspaper. They are so rudimentary that each sold stamp is authenticated by the handwritten initials of the postmaster or of one of his clerks.
These first stamps of 4, 8 and 12 cents are not rare because they have attracted the interest of collectors from the 1870s. These circular or roughly octagonal stamps are nicknamed the cottonreels. An additional cottonreel of 2 cents was issued in 1851. This low value only applied for the local mail inside Georgetown and this variety is extremely rare.
In 1852 the government takes control of operations. Stamps for British Guiana are now lithographed in England. In September 1855, it is a disaster. British agents had misunderstood the order and printed a quantity of stamps ten times lower than needed. Faced with the shortage, Dalton released in 1856 a new series of locally printed British Guiana stamps, with the same rudimentary process as in 1850.
The 4 cents stamp of 1856 to be used for mail is printed on colored paper in four variants, magenta, carmine, blue and double sided blue.
The 1 cent for the postage of newspapers is a lower denomination that had no reason to be kept by users. Only one survived. In poor condition, almost indecipherable, it is magenta in the same shade as one of the 4 cent variants. Collected in 1873 by a schoolboy in the archives of his uncle, it was formally authenticated by an expert in 1891.
This 1 cent magenta 29 x 26 mm British Guiana stamp is the only British variety that escapes the royal collection. Its reverse bears eight marks of prominent owners. Sold for $ 935K by Siegel in 1980, it was already at that time the most expensive stamp in the world.
It was sold by Sotheby's for $ 9.5M on June 17, 2014 and for $ 8.3M on June 8, 2021, lot 3. The image is shared by Wikimedia. Please watch a video shared in 2008 by psychediva.
In June 2014 the other lots from the DuPont collection of British Guiana stamps were sold by David Feldman. The top results before fees were € 160K for a 4 cents from 1850-1851 on a cover, € 190K for a 2 cents from 1851 and € 240K for a blue 4 cents on a cover from 1856.
The first stamps issued by the British Guiana in 1850 are made in black ink by woodcut printing on papers of various colors depending on the face value. The work is done by the printer of the local newspaper. They are so rudimentary that each sold stamp is authenticated by the handwritten initials of the postmaster or of one of his clerks.
These first stamps of 4, 8 and 12 cents are not rare because they have attracted the interest of collectors from the 1870s. These circular or roughly octagonal stamps are nicknamed the cottonreels. An additional cottonreel of 2 cents was issued in 1851. This low value only applied for the local mail inside Georgetown and this variety is extremely rare.
In 1852 the government takes control of operations. Stamps for British Guiana are now lithographed in England. In September 1855, it is a disaster. British agents had misunderstood the order and printed a quantity of stamps ten times lower than needed. Faced with the shortage, Dalton released in 1856 a new series of locally printed British Guiana stamps, with the same rudimentary process as in 1850.
The 4 cents stamp of 1856 to be used for mail is printed on colored paper in four variants, magenta, carmine, blue and double sided blue.
The 1 cent for the postage of newspapers is a lower denomination that had no reason to be kept by users. Only one survived. In poor condition, almost indecipherable, it is magenta in the same shade as one of the 4 cent variants. Collected in 1873 by a schoolboy in the archives of his uncle, it was formally authenticated by an expert in 1891.
This 1 cent magenta 29 x 26 mm British Guiana stamp is the only British variety that escapes the royal collection. Its reverse bears eight marks of prominent owners. Sold for $ 935K by Siegel in 1980, it was already at that time the most expensive stamp in the world.
It was sold by Sotheby's for $ 9.5M on June 17, 2014 and for $ 8.3M on June 8, 2021, lot 3. The image is shared by Wikimedia. Please watch a video shared in 2008 by psychediva.
In June 2014 the other lots from the DuPont collection of British Guiana stamps were sold by David Feldman. The top results before fees were € 160K for a 4 cents from 1850-1851 on a cover, € 190K for a 2 cents from 1851 and € 240K for a blue 4 cents on a cover from 1856.
1923 A Caipirinha by Tarsila
2020 SOLD for BRL 57.5M (worth US$ 11.2M) by Bolsa de Arte
Tarsila do Amaral was in Paris in 1923. She was enthusiastic about the cosmopolitan desires of the artistic avant-gardes. She is the Brazilian, and more precisely a caipirinha. The caipiras are those people from the tropical countryside who are the laughing stock of city dwellers by their naivety and their appalling accent.
She is influenced by André Lhote's cubism, where the slightly deformed figurative elements are distributed on the canvas without consideration of their respective distances, with a partitioned geometry and simple colors.
On December 17, 2020, Bolsa de Arte sold A Caipirinha, oil on canvas 60 x 81 cm painted by Tarsila in Paris in 1923, for BRL 57.5M, worth US $ 11.2M. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The artist expresses the resolutely optimistic happiness of her childhood, when she was making her doll from the leaves collected in front of the farm. This allusion is not directly visible. The character is an adult and the doll is not there, but the symbolic leaf is in the foreground under the hand.
The iconography is bold, with some repetitions with no link in the meaning. The hand with five parallel fingers and the palisade with six boards are similar. The barn door on the right is copied to the left, where it loses its meaning by a position in front of the tree.
In the same period, Tarsila also shakes up the morphologies, without however joining the surrealists. Allusions to rural Brazil dot all her work, through ethnological details, tropical light, farm life. This resolutely regionalist art anticipates the school of Mexico.
She is influenced by André Lhote's cubism, where the slightly deformed figurative elements are distributed on the canvas without consideration of their respective distances, with a partitioned geometry and simple colors.
On December 17, 2020, Bolsa de Arte sold A Caipirinha, oil on canvas 60 x 81 cm painted by Tarsila in Paris in 1923, for BRL 57.5M, worth US $ 11.2M. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The artist expresses the resolutely optimistic happiness of her childhood, when she was making her doll from the leaves collected in front of the farm. This allusion is not directly visible. The character is an adult and the doll is not there, but the symbolic leaf is in the foreground under the hand.
The iconography is bold, with some repetitions with no link in the meaning. The hand with five parallel fingers and the palisade with six boards are similar. The barn door on the right is copied to the left, where it loses its meaning by a position in front of the tree.
In the same period, Tarsila also shakes up the morphologies, without however joining the surrealists. Allusions to rural Brazil dot all her work, through ethnological details, tropical light, farm life. This resolutely regionalist art anticipates the school of Mexico.
1931 The Rivals by Rivera
2022 SOLD for $ 14M by Christie's
The Mexican muralism was born in 1921 from an observation by Vasconcelos : the people are mostly illiterate but the public image can be as suitable as a writing for propagating the fervor of the Revolution. Orozco, Rivera, Siqueiros and Tamayo create a new art adapted to the socialist ideas.
Out of standards in every meaning of that wording, Diego Riverais uncompromising. His artistic message is communist and anticlerical and he will not change it even under the pressure generated by his provocations.
In New York City, Abby Rockefeller begins in 1925 a collection of modern European art which is not so much supported by her husband but she moves forward. The creation of the Museum of Modern Art in 1929 comes mainly from her personal initiative. She multiplies the actions, including a first solo exhibition which is dedicated to Matisse.
Mexican art shows mostly the people, even if they are confronted with the abuses from the bourgeoisie. Abby, who was also collecting folk art, devotes the second solo exhibition of the MoMA to Rivera in 1931. The thunderous artist had been accused of anti-Soviet activities while working in Moscow and the Mexican Communist Party had fired him. Some recent activities in California showed his interest to the United States.
John D. Rockefeller Jr, Abby's husband, does not see the political trap. In 1933 he commissions some murals for the Rockefeller Center to Rivera. Without warning, Rivera introduces into the picture a portrait of Lenin and categorically refuses to withdraw it despite an attempted negotiation by the young Nelson Rockefeller. The fresco is scrapped but Rivera has achieved his goal of ridiculing the capitalists.
With the invitation of 1931 Abby Rockefeller had commissioned an artwork to Rivera. He completed it during the boat journey to New York. The Rivals, oil on canvas 152 x 127 cm, is about a celebration of patron saints in Oaxaca. The composition is animated at various distances by groups of characters in local clothing, with the shimmering exotic colors that pleased Abby. This picture is in the recent decorative style of Matisse.
The Rivals was given as a wedding present to David and Peggy Rockefeller in 1941. Coming from their deceased estate, it was sold for $ 9.8M by Christie's on May 9, 2018, lot 424. Coming afterward from the Paul G. Allen collection, it was sold for $ 14M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 37.
Out of standards in every meaning of that wording, Diego Riverais uncompromising. His artistic message is communist and anticlerical and he will not change it even under the pressure generated by his provocations.
In New York City, Abby Rockefeller begins in 1925 a collection of modern European art which is not so much supported by her husband but she moves forward. The creation of the Museum of Modern Art in 1929 comes mainly from her personal initiative. She multiplies the actions, including a first solo exhibition which is dedicated to Matisse.
Mexican art shows mostly the people, even if they are confronted with the abuses from the bourgeoisie. Abby, who was also collecting folk art, devotes the second solo exhibition of the MoMA to Rivera in 1931. The thunderous artist had been accused of anti-Soviet activities while working in Moscow and the Mexican Communist Party had fired him. Some recent activities in California showed his interest to the United States.
John D. Rockefeller Jr, Abby's husband, does not see the political trap. In 1933 he commissions some murals for the Rockefeller Center to Rivera. Without warning, Rivera introduces into the picture a portrait of Lenin and categorically refuses to withdraw it despite an attempted negotiation by the young Nelson Rockefeller. The fresco is scrapped but Rivera has achieved his goal of ridiculing the capitalists.
With the invitation of 1931 Abby Rockefeller had commissioned an artwork to Rivera. He completed it during the boat journey to New York. The Rivals, oil on canvas 152 x 127 cm, is about a celebration of patron saints in Oaxaca. The composition is animated at various distances by groups of characters in local clothing, with the shimmering exotic colors that pleased Abby. This picture is in the recent decorative style of Matisse.
The Rivals was given as a wedding present to David and Peggy Rockefeller in 1941. Coming from their deceased estate, it was sold for $ 9.8M by Christie's on May 9, 2018, lot 424. Coming afterward from the Paul G. Allen collection, it was sold for $ 14M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 37.
KAHLO
1
1933 Ugly Self Portrait
2022 SOLD for $ 8.6M by Christie's
In 1933 Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo stay in New York from March to end of year. While Diego works for the project of a mural for the Rockefeller center, Frida goes crazy with the dime stores of cheap costume jewelry. Lucienne Bloch is her shopping companion.
She soon gets bored of New York which she nicknames 'Gringolandia'. Her health is poor and she does not set to paint.
A self portrait on Celotex insulation board 27 x 22 cm is an exception, using colors that she was grinding for Diego's plastered fresco panels.
In her usual practice she endeavors to express her mood. She displays herself as very ugly, in her own words. It was in summer while she already was in homesickness for Mexico and while Diego had an affair with Louise Nevelson.
The low cost necklace is a sign of her disenchantment from New York. The background is tagged as Basquiat will do in the same city half a century later. Tags are read 'SIRV, OH! BOY, VERY U and FRIEDA (sic)' plus a sad bird and a big apple. The overall contour of the image is irregularly curved.
This emotional painting was gifted by Frida to Lucienne who kept it for half a century. It was sold for $ 8.6M from a lower estimate of $ 7M by Christie's on November 17, 2022, lot 31.
She soon gets bored of New York which she nicknames 'Gringolandia'. Her health is poor and she does not set to paint.
A self portrait on Celotex insulation board 27 x 22 cm is an exception, using colors that she was grinding for Diego's plastered fresco panels.
In her usual practice she endeavors to express her mood. She displays herself as very ugly, in her own words. It was in summer while she already was in homesickness for Mexico and while Diego had an affair with Louise Nevelson.
The low cost necklace is a sign of her disenchantment from New York. The background is tagged as Basquiat will do in the same city half a century later. Tags are read 'SIRV, OH! BOY, VERY U and FRIEDA (sic)' plus a sad bird and a big apple. The overall contour of the image is irregularly curved.
This emotional painting was gifted by Frida to Lucienne who kept it for half a century. It was sold for $ 8.6M from a lower estimate of $ 7M by Christie's on November 17, 2022, lot 31.
2
1940 El Sueno (La Carna)
2025 SOLD for $ 55M by Sotheby's
El sueño (La cama), oil on canvas 74 x 98 cm painted in 1940 by Frida Kahlo in 1940, was sold for $ 55M from a lower estimate of $ 40M for sale by Sotheby's on November 20, 2025, lot 13. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
Asking Grok its significance in the career of the artist.
Grok thought :
Frida Kahlo's El sueño (La cama) (The Dream [The Bed]), painted in 1940, is a poignant self-portrait that encapsulates key themes in her oeuvre, including mortality, the interplay between life and death, personal suffering, and dreamlike surrealism. Measuring 74 by 98 cm and executed in oil on canvas, the work depicts Kahlo asleep in a bed floating amid clouds, her body partially entwined in thorny vines that evoke both growth and entrapment. Above her, on the bed's canopy, lies a life-sized papier-mâché skeleton (a "Judas" figure from Mexican folk tradition, which Kahlo kept in her real bedroom as a memento mori), rigged with dynamite and a lit fuse—symbolizing imminent danger and the fragility of existence. This juxtaposition of serene repose below and explosive peril above reflects Kahlo's lifelong preoccupation with death, informed by her chronic pain from a 1925 bus accident, multiple surgeries, miscarriages, and emotional turmoil.
In the context of Kahlo's career, El sueño (La cama) marks a significant moment during a period of intense personal upheaval and artistic evolution. Created shortly after her 1939 divorce from Diego Rivera (whom she remarried later in 1940) and amid her affair with Leon Trotsky, who was assassinated that year, the painting channels her psychological and physical anguish into a deeply introspective narrative. It exemplifies her shift toward more symbolic, introspective works in the late 1930s and early 1940s, blending autobiographical elements with Mexican cultural motifs and surrealist influences—though Kahlo famously rejected the Surrealist label, insisting her art depicted her reality. This piece stands out as one of her most intimate explorations of vulnerability, where the bed (a recurring motif representing confinement due to her health issues) becomes a stage for confronting mortality while asserting life's persistence through natural imagery like vines.
The painting's importance is underscored by its extensive exhibition history, including major retrospectives at Tate Modern (2005), the Walker Art Center (2007-08), and the Guggenheim Museum (1999), as well as its inclusion in seminal publications like Hayden Herrera's Frida Kahlo: The Paintings (1991) and Luis-Martín Lozano's The Complete Paintings of Frida Kahlo (2021), where it has even graced book covers. It has been analyzed as a testament to Kahlo's resilience, transforming personal trauma into universal symbols of human fragility. Provenance traces back to Galería Misrachi in Mexico City, with ownership passing through private collections before its last auction at Sotheby's in 1980; its reappearance at Sotheby's Exquisite Corpus Evening Auction on November 20, 2025 (lot 13, estimated at $40-60 million), highlights its rarity and market value, potentially shattering her auction record and affirming her status as a 20th-century icon.
Pre sale Grok thought :
Quote
Sotheby's @Sothebys Sep 19
More than 80 Surrealist treasures from a Private Collection are coming to The New York Sales in November—including Frida Kahlo’s intimate self-portrait that is poised to set a new auction record. https://bit.ly/4mo8kGU
Asking Grok its significance in the career of the artist.
Grok thought :
Frida Kahlo's El sueño (La cama) (The Dream [The Bed]), painted in 1940, is a poignant self-portrait that encapsulates key themes in her oeuvre, including mortality, the interplay between life and death, personal suffering, and dreamlike surrealism. Measuring 74 by 98 cm and executed in oil on canvas, the work depicts Kahlo asleep in a bed floating amid clouds, her body partially entwined in thorny vines that evoke both growth and entrapment. Above her, on the bed's canopy, lies a life-sized papier-mâché skeleton (a "Judas" figure from Mexican folk tradition, which Kahlo kept in her real bedroom as a memento mori), rigged with dynamite and a lit fuse—symbolizing imminent danger and the fragility of existence. This juxtaposition of serene repose below and explosive peril above reflects Kahlo's lifelong preoccupation with death, informed by her chronic pain from a 1925 bus accident, multiple surgeries, miscarriages, and emotional turmoil.
In the context of Kahlo's career, El sueño (La cama) marks a significant moment during a period of intense personal upheaval and artistic evolution. Created shortly after her 1939 divorce from Diego Rivera (whom she remarried later in 1940) and amid her affair with Leon Trotsky, who was assassinated that year, the painting channels her psychological and physical anguish into a deeply introspective narrative. It exemplifies her shift toward more symbolic, introspective works in the late 1930s and early 1940s, blending autobiographical elements with Mexican cultural motifs and surrealist influences—though Kahlo famously rejected the Surrealist label, insisting her art depicted her reality. This piece stands out as one of her most intimate explorations of vulnerability, where the bed (a recurring motif representing confinement due to her health issues) becomes a stage for confronting mortality while asserting life's persistence through natural imagery like vines.
The painting's importance is underscored by its extensive exhibition history, including major retrospectives at Tate Modern (2005), the Walker Art Center (2007-08), and the Guggenheim Museum (1999), as well as its inclusion in seminal publications like Hayden Herrera's Frida Kahlo: The Paintings (1991) and Luis-Martín Lozano's The Complete Paintings of Frida Kahlo (2021), where it has even graced book covers. It has been analyzed as a testament to Kahlo's resilience, transforming personal trauma into universal symbols of human fragility. Provenance traces back to Galería Misrachi in Mexico City, with ownership passing through private collections before its last auction at Sotheby's in 1980; its reappearance at Sotheby's Exquisite Corpus Evening Auction on November 20, 2025 (lot 13, estimated at $40-60 million), highlights its rarity and market value, potentially shattering her auction record and affirming her status as a 20th-century icon.
Pre sale Grok thought :
Quote
Sotheby's @Sothebys Sep 19
More than 80 Surrealist treasures from a Private Collection are coming to The New York Sales in November—including Frida Kahlo’s intimate self-portrait that is poised to set a new auction record. https://bit.ly/4mo8kGU
- Sotheby's post highlights the upcoming "Exquisite Corpus" auction in New York on November 20-21, 2025, showcasing over 80 Surrealist works from a private collection, emphasizing psychological depth in 20th-century art.
- The centerpiece is Frida Kahlo's 1940 oil "El sueño (La cama)", a dreamlike self-portrait of the artist asleep on a bed atop a barren landscape, carrying a $40-60 million estimate that could shatter her prior $34.9 million record and top the $44.4 million benchmark for any female artist.
- Amid rising demand for women-led Surrealism, the sale includes pieces by Miró, Picasso, and Kandinsky, providing collectors access to rare modernist narratives on identity and the subconscious.
'El sueño (La cama)' by Frida Kahlo soars to $54.7 million, becoming the most valuable work by a woman artist ever sold at auction.
— Sotheby's (@Sothebys) November 21, 2025
Painted in 1940 during a pivotal decade in her career, marked by her turbulent relationship with Diego Rivera. pic.twitter.com/t6Sni7fIKT
3
1949 Diego y yo
2021 SOLD for $ 35M by Sotheby's
Frida Kahlo suffered a lifelong intense pain in her back after an accident. She courageously faced her condition by her art and by her quest for a passion out of the ordinary, including political commitment and bisexuality. She found her partner, unfaithful husband and accomplice in the Communist artist Diego Rivera, 20 years older than her.
Kahlo's art is made of metaphors and symbols with a high poetry. A friend of the Surrealists, she nevertheless insisted to state that she was not representing her dreams but her reality. 55 of her ca 143 paintings are self portraits.
Eager to exchange an empathy, she often made and inscribed self portraits for friends : Trotsky, her doctors. On November 16, 2021, Sotheby's sold such a self portrait for $ 35M, lot 12. This oil on masonite 30 x 22 cm painted in 1949 is dedicated to Florence and Sam, a couple of friends who were instrumental in promoting her art. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The piece was titled Diego y yo by the artist. It displays the portrait in bust of Diego Rivera on the forehead, fully centered between eyebrows and hair. This figure has at the same place the third eye of wisdom. The intimate theme of this self portrait is indeed her obsession for Diego. Three tears flow on her cheeks.
A self portrait executed in 1954, the year of her untimely death, is in the same inspiration, with the image of Diego on the breast and of her rival Maria between the eyebrows.
Grok thought :
Quote
Sotheby's @Sothebys Nov 17, 2021
#AuctionUpdate: Frida Kahlo’s 1949 self-portrait ‘Diego y yo (Diego and I)’ soars to $34.9M, smashing the artist’s previous $8 million public auction record. This enigmatic work is Kahlo’s final ‘bust’ self-portrait completed before her death in 1954.
Kahlo's art is made of metaphors and symbols with a high poetry. A friend of the Surrealists, she nevertheless insisted to state that she was not representing her dreams but her reality. 55 of her ca 143 paintings are self portraits.
Eager to exchange an empathy, she often made and inscribed self portraits for friends : Trotsky, her doctors. On November 16, 2021, Sotheby's sold such a self portrait for $ 35M, lot 12. This oil on masonite 30 x 22 cm painted in 1949 is dedicated to Florence and Sam, a couple of friends who were instrumental in promoting her art. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The piece was titled Diego y yo by the artist. It displays the portrait in bust of Diego Rivera on the forehead, fully centered between eyebrows and hair. This figure has at the same place the third eye of wisdom. The intimate theme of this self portrait is indeed her obsession for Diego. Three tears flow on her cheeks.
A self portrait executed in 1954, the year of her untimely death, is in the same inspiration, with the image of Diego on the breast and of her rival Maria between the eyebrows.
Grok thought :
Quote
Sotheby's @Sothebys Nov 17, 2021
#AuctionUpdate: Frida Kahlo’s 1949 self-portrait ‘Diego y yo (Diego and I)’ soars to $34.9M, smashing the artist’s previous $8 million public auction record. This enigmatic work is Kahlo’s final ‘bust’ self-portrait completed before her death in 1954.
- Sotheby's 2021 post celebrates the $34.9 million auction sale of Frida Kahlo's 1949 oil-on-masonite self-portrait "Diego y yo," depicting Kahlo with tears and Diego Rivera's face emerging from her forehead, symbolizing her enduring emotional turmoil in their marriage.
- The work, Kahlo's last bust-length self-portrait before her 1954 death from health complications, shattered her prior $8 million record and was consigned by the Oppenheimer family after decades in private collection.
- As of November 2025, this sale's record has been eclipsed by Kahlo's "El sueño (La cama)" fetching $54.7 million at Sotheby's, marking the highest price for any artwork by a woman at public auction.
1943 Omi Obini by Lam
2020 SOLD for $ 9.6M by Sotheby's
Wifredo Lam lived in Spain from 1923 to 1938. He felt close to Goya's social revolt and participated in the Spanish War. Between the defeat of the Republicans and the defeat of France in June 1940, he was in Paris where he appropriated the intense desire for freedom and poetry of the artistic avant-gardes. Picasso, who indeed did not like having rivals, openly approved the young artist.
Lam then decides to return to his native island, Cuba. He makes a stopover in Fort-de-France where his meeting with Aimé Césaire reinforces his rejection of colonialism and slavery.
The atheist Cuban with Chinese, Congolese and Spanish ancestry will now paint the freedom of the Third World. He stages his personal surrealist world in a dense jungle which he populates with gods of weird morphology. La Jungla, 240 x 230 cm gouache made in 1943, hides four dehumanized beings in a dense pattern of sugar canes.
On June 29, 2020, Sotheby's sold for $ 9.6M Omi Obini, oil on canvas 183 x 125 cm also painted in 1943, lot 1008. The title designates the Yoruba goddess of water entrusted for fertilizing the earth. Readability is not immediate, marking the influence of analytical cubism or futurism.
In the colored jungle, some paler areas appear, constituting an ethereal humanoid form. The head is a crescent moon and it will not be known whether the figure in the foreground is a pet or a chair. Two of the berries have each a pair of eyes that are threats or reflections.
Idolo (Oya), subtitled in French La Divinité de l'air et de la mort, oil and charcoal on canvas 157 x 128 cm painted in 1944, was sold by Sotheby's for $ 7.4M on November 20, 2025, lot 110.
Lam then decides to return to his native island, Cuba. He makes a stopover in Fort-de-France where his meeting with Aimé Césaire reinforces his rejection of colonialism and slavery.
The atheist Cuban with Chinese, Congolese and Spanish ancestry will now paint the freedom of the Third World. He stages his personal surrealist world in a dense jungle which he populates with gods of weird morphology. La Jungla, 240 x 230 cm gouache made in 1943, hides four dehumanized beings in a dense pattern of sugar canes.
On June 29, 2020, Sotheby's sold for $ 9.6M Omi Obini, oil on canvas 183 x 125 cm also painted in 1943, lot 1008. The title designates the Yoruba goddess of water entrusted for fertilizing the earth. Readability is not immediate, marking the influence of analytical cubism or futurism.
In the colored jungle, some paler areas appear, constituting an ethereal humanoid form. The head is a crescent moon and it will not be known whether the figure in the foreground is a pet or a chair. Two of the berries have each a pair of eyes that are threats or reflections.
Idolo (Oya), subtitled in French La Divinité de l'air et de la mort, oil and charcoal on canvas 157 x 128 cm painted in 1944, was sold by Sotheby's for $ 7.4M on November 20, 2025, lot 110.
CARRINGTON
1
1945 Les Distractions de Dagobert
2024 SOLD for $ 28.5M by Sotheby's
A natural rebel, the English born Leonora Carrington began her career with novels that appealed the Surrealists. She had an affair with Max Ernst and began painting. Aged 21 in 1938, Inn of the Dawn Horse is a self portrait with a hyena pet and a rocking horse with a background garden traveled by a white horse.
Her surrealist life in a bucolic French village in couple with Ernst was interrupted when he was arrested as a German citizen. Carrington fled alone to Spain where she had to be interned for psychotic hallucinations. She did not meet Ernst again.
In 1942 President Manuel Avila Camacho opened Mexico to European artists who fled the war. In Mexico City they could join a rich and highly original artistic tradition including the muralists and the couple Kahlo-Rivera. Carrington built a friendly community of women with the Spanish Remedios Varo and the Hungarian photographer Kati Horna.
The French titled Les Distractions de Dagobert, painted by Carrington in 1945, is a joyful synthesis of her wide knowledge of myths and occultism mingled with her dreams and the memory of her hallucinations. The profusion of details reminds Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights and Dante's subterranean world.
The small scale central figure in a surrealist chariot is the French medieval king reputed for his sexual appetite. The composition around him is divided into the four classical elements of earth, air, wind and fire. An unlimited empty stairs rises to paradise while female teratological hybrids display their occupational. A reclining figure in a flying hammock is certainly a self portrait.
This egg tempera on masonite 76 x 87 cm was sold for $ 28.5M from a lower estimate of $ 12M by Sotheby's on May 15, 2024, lot 20. Please watch the interview of the winning bidder, shared by the auction house.
Les Distractions de Dagobert (1945) by Leonora Carrington is widely regarded as her magnum opus and a pivotal masterpiece in her career. Painted in September 1945, shortly after she settled in Mexico City in 1943, this tempera on Masonite work marks the culmination of her artistic maturation during a transformative period.
Carrington, a British-born Surrealist who fled war-torn Europe, found creative freedom in Mexico among exiled Surrealists (such as Remedios Varo and Wolfgang Paalen) and Mexican modernists (including Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera). There, she rejected the "muse" role imposed by figures like André Breton and Max Ernst, developing a highly personal style infused with Celtic mythology, alchemy, the occult, and feminist themes. This painting represents the crowning achievement of that era, showcasing her at the height of her technical and imaginative powers—with intricate Bosch-like details, hybrid creatures, symbolic vignettes tied to the four elements, and luminous color.
It was a highlight of her acclaimed 1948 solo exhibition at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York, and has since featured in major shows, including the 2022 Venice Biennale-related exhibition at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection ("Surrealism and Magic: Enchanted Modernity"), where it was a thematic centerpiece.
The work's significance was dramatically underscored when it sold at Sotheby's Modern Evening Auction on May 15, 2024 (lot 20) for $28.5 million (including fees), shattering Carrington's previous auction record of $3.3 million (set in 2022) and establishing a new benchmark for a British-born female artist. Acquired by Argentine collector Eduardo F. Costantini, it reflects the growing recognition of female Surrealists and Carrington's enduring influence on 20th-century art.
Her surrealist life in a bucolic French village in couple with Ernst was interrupted when he was arrested as a German citizen. Carrington fled alone to Spain where she had to be interned for psychotic hallucinations. She did not meet Ernst again.
In 1942 President Manuel Avila Camacho opened Mexico to European artists who fled the war. In Mexico City they could join a rich and highly original artistic tradition including the muralists and the couple Kahlo-Rivera. Carrington built a friendly community of women with the Spanish Remedios Varo and the Hungarian photographer Kati Horna.
The French titled Les Distractions de Dagobert, painted by Carrington in 1945, is a joyful synthesis of her wide knowledge of myths and occultism mingled with her dreams and the memory of her hallucinations. The profusion of details reminds Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights and Dante's subterranean world.
The small scale central figure in a surrealist chariot is the French medieval king reputed for his sexual appetite. The composition around him is divided into the four classical elements of earth, air, wind and fire. An unlimited empty stairs rises to paradise while female teratological hybrids display their occupational. A reclining figure in a flying hammock is certainly a self portrait.
This egg tempera on masonite 76 x 87 cm was sold for $ 28.5M from a lower estimate of $ 12M by Sotheby's on May 15, 2024, lot 20. Please watch the interview of the winning bidder, shared by the auction house.
Les Distractions de Dagobert (1945) by Leonora Carrington is widely regarded as her magnum opus and a pivotal masterpiece in her career. Painted in September 1945, shortly after she settled in Mexico City in 1943, this tempera on Masonite work marks the culmination of her artistic maturation during a transformative period.
Carrington, a British-born Surrealist who fled war-torn Europe, found creative freedom in Mexico among exiled Surrealists (such as Remedios Varo and Wolfgang Paalen) and Mexican modernists (including Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera). There, she rejected the "muse" role imposed by figures like André Breton and Max Ernst, developing a highly personal style infused with Celtic mythology, alchemy, the occult, and feminist themes. This painting represents the crowning achievement of that era, showcasing her at the height of her technical and imaginative powers—with intricate Bosch-like details, hybrid creatures, symbolic vignettes tied to the four elements, and luminous color.
It was a highlight of her acclaimed 1948 solo exhibition at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York, and has since featured in major shows, including the 2022 Venice Biennale-related exhibition at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection ("Surrealism and Magic: Enchanted Modernity"), where it was a thematic centerpiece.
The work's significance was dramatically underscored when it sold at Sotheby's Modern Evening Auction on May 15, 2024 (lot 20) for $28.5 million (including fees), shattering Carrington's previous auction record of $3.3 million (set in 2022) and establishing a new benchmark for a British-born female artist. Acquired by Argentine collector Eduardo F. Costantini, it reflects the growing recognition of female Surrealists and Carrington's enduring influence on 20th-century art.
2
1951 La Grande Dame / The Cat Woman
2024 SOLD for $ 11.4M by Sotheby's
Leonora Carrington was born in England to an Irish mother. As a young girl she was fascinated by the stories of the occult told to her by her maternal grandmother. Exiled in Mexico during the Second World War after having tried a Surrealist life in France with Max Ernst, she became aware of Aztec and Mayan traditions.
La Grande Dame, English title The Cat Woman, is a larger than life sculpture painted in oil by Carrington with fantastical creatures of witchcraft and rebirth. The wood had been carved by Jose Horna, the husband of her fellow surrealist the photographer Kati Horna. The overall shape reminds an antique Egyptian hybrid goddess. The figure was indeed influenced by the cat goddess Bastet.
This 2 m high figure executed in 1951 was sold for $ 11.4M from a lower estimate of $ 5M by Sotheby's on November 18, 2024, lot 103. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
These themes were in the air. It is no coincidence that the UK lifted in the same year the prohibition of the studies about the magic and the occult. La Grande Dame is also a representation of the female energy by a woman in the art world dominated by men.
La Grande Dame, English title The Cat Woman, is a larger than life sculpture painted in oil by Carrington with fantastical creatures of witchcraft and rebirth. The wood had been carved by Jose Horna, the husband of her fellow surrealist the photographer Kati Horna. The overall shape reminds an antique Egyptian hybrid goddess. The figure was indeed influenced by the cat goddess Bastet.
This 2 m high figure executed in 1951 was sold for $ 11.4M from a lower estimate of $ 5M by Sotheby's on November 18, 2024, lot 103. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
These themes were in the air. It is no coincidence that the UK lifted in the same year the prohibition of the studies about the magic and the occult. La Grande Dame is also a representation of the female energy by a woman in the art world dominated by men.
1986 Diego Maradona Shirt
2022 SOLD for £ 7.1M by Sotheby's
On June 22, 1986, a quarterfinal of the FIFA World Cup was played in Mexico City between Argentina and England. The Argentinians led by their 25 year old captain Diego Maradona minded it like a revenge after the 1982 Falklands War.
Maradona scored within four minutes at the beginning of the second half two goals that were to become legendary for opposite reasons.
He opened the score with a goal helped by his hand. At that time when no video support was available for the referees, the point was declared as valid in an atmosphere of triumph supported by Maradona's spectacular celebration. Fully aware of his mischief, Maradona commented in the post game press conference that he made the goal “un poco con la cabeza de Maradona y otro poco con la mano de Dios".
The decisive goal of the match was scored by Maradona four minutes after the Hand of God. This one is a great demonstration of Maradona's superior dribbling skills as he had been able to pass four defenders in a run of half the length of the pitch. It will referred in 2002 as The Goal of the Century and described as the greatest individual goal of all time. The image of Diego celebrating that feat is shared by Wikimedia.
A later English goal put the final score to 2-1.
Steve Hodge had been involved as an English defender in both Maradona's winning actions. He managed to swap his shirt for Maradona's in the changing room. Please watch the interview shared by Goal of Steve Hodge as 'the Man with Maradona's shirt of God'.
Maradona's shirt of the Hand of God and the Goal of the Century was loaned from 2002 by Hodge to the National Football Museum in Manchester. It was then consigned by him to Sotheby's who commissioned conclusively to Resolution Photomatching the photo-matching with the quarterfinal. It was sold for £ 7.1M from a lower estimate of £ 4M on May 4, 2022, lot 1.
Maradona scored within four minutes at the beginning of the second half two goals that were to become legendary for opposite reasons.
He opened the score with a goal helped by his hand. At that time when no video support was available for the referees, the point was declared as valid in an atmosphere of triumph supported by Maradona's spectacular celebration. Fully aware of his mischief, Maradona commented in the post game press conference that he made the goal “un poco con la cabeza de Maradona y otro poco con la mano de Dios".
The decisive goal of the match was scored by Maradona four minutes after the Hand of God. This one is a great demonstration of Maradona's superior dribbling skills as he had been able to pass four defenders in a run of half the length of the pitch. It will referred in 2002 as The Goal of the Century and described as the greatest individual goal of all time. The image of Diego celebrating that feat is shared by Wikimedia.
A later English goal put the final score to 2-1.
Steve Hodge had been involved as an English defender in both Maradona's winning actions. He managed to swap his shirt for Maradona's in the changing room. Please watch the interview shared by Goal of Steve Hodge as 'the Man with Maradona's shirt of God'.
Maradona's shirt of the Hand of God and the Goal of the Century was loaned from 2002 by Hodge to the National Football Museum in Manchester. It was then consigned by him to Sotheby's who commissioned conclusively to Resolution Photomatching the photo-matching with the quarterfinal. It was sold for £ 7.1M from a lower estimate of £ 4M on May 4, 2022, lot 1.
1992 Untitled (America) by Gonzalez-Torres
2024 SOLD for $ 13.6M by Christie's
A Cuban born conceptual artist working in New York, Felix Gonzalez-Torres managed to define a new form of art with which the exhibition curator and even the visitor is invited to change or pick elements at will.
His installations were made of everyday materials such as strings of light bulbs, stacks of paper and individually wrapped candies. A young child may pick and eat a candy, the heights of the paper stacks may be recomposed.
A string has no permanent shape. In 1991 the artist suspended two standard lightbulbs from entwined electrical cords. The burn out of a bulb is a symbol of death, more precisely in that case a tribute to his gay partner who had recently died of AIDS at 32. The # 14 from an edition of 20 plus 2 artist's proofs was sold for $ 635K by Phillips on May 17, 2023, lot 40.
In 1992 he extended similar installations to a typical 42 bulbs. He advised for bulbs to be immediately replaced when they burn out. These light strings were all titled Untitled, with a subtitle in brackets to identify each example. They radiate some warmth. A comparison with Donald Judd's minimalist piles is relevant.
Untitled (America # 3), executed in 1992, is made of 42 light bulbs, porcelain light sockets and a single electrical cord in series for a total length of 12.8 m. It was sold for $ 13.6M from a lower estimate of $ 8M for sale by Christie's on May 14, 2024, lot 6A. The auction house selected to display it hanging from ceiling with the 10 lower positions lying on the ground. On the photos in the catalogue, all the bulbs are lit.
Gonzalez-Torres died like a bulb in his turn from AIDS in 1996, aged 38.
His installations were made of everyday materials such as strings of light bulbs, stacks of paper and individually wrapped candies. A young child may pick and eat a candy, the heights of the paper stacks may be recomposed.
A string has no permanent shape. In 1991 the artist suspended two standard lightbulbs from entwined electrical cords. The burn out of a bulb is a symbol of death, more precisely in that case a tribute to his gay partner who had recently died of AIDS at 32. The # 14 from an edition of 20 plus 2 artist's proofs was sold for $ 635K by Phillips on May 17, 2023, lot 40.
In 1992 he extended similar installations to a typical 42 bulbs. He advised for bulbs to be immediately replaced when they burn out. These light strings were all titled Untitled, with a subtitle in brackets to identify each example. They radiate some warmth. A comparison with Donald Judd's minimalist piles is relevant.
Untitled (America # 3), executed in 1992, is made of 42 light bulbs, porcelain light sockets and a single electrical cord in series for a total length of 12.8 m. It was sold for $ 13.6M from a lower estimate of $ 8M for sale by Christie's on May 14, 2024, lot 6A. The auction house selected to display it hanging from ceiling with the 10 lower positions lying on the ground. On the photos in the catalogue, all the bulbs are lit.
Gonzalez-Torres died like a bulb in his turn from AIDS in 1996, aged 38.
