Mantegna Descent into Limbo sold for $28.6m

Basia Johnson's Mantegna sold today at Sotheby's for a hammer price of some $25.5m. The buyer hasn't been identified, but may well be the Getty Museum -- which offered some $25m for the painting several years back (Johnson wanted a few million more, and wouldn't come down). Report from Newsday here; another in La Repubblica (in Italian).

Apparently the two Rubenses, the Pontormo, and the Botticelli in the same sale did not reach reserve; Taddeo Gaddi's Saint Matthew, however, sold at a hammer price of $720,000.

HERE'S MORE from the NY Times.

Posted by David on January 23, 2003 3:38 PM