Returned Kirchner to auction

Barely a week after the German government returned a 1913 painting by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner to the heirs of Jewish collectors who owned it before World War II, Christie’s said yesterday that it would auction the work in New York on Nov. 8.

Experts estimate that the painting, “Street Scene, Berlin,’’ a colorful canvas of an urban crowd painted mainly in blues with a prostitute in a bright red dress toward the left, could sell for $18 million to $25 million. It is considered one of Kirchner’s finest street scenes, painted at the height of his career.

Posted by David on August 3, 2006 3:17 PM