A Mark Rothko painting from 1957, titled 鈥淣o. 22 (reds)鈥, sold for roughly $70 million at the end of February. While certainly an enormous sum of money for a piece of art, it doesn鈥檛 even make the top 30 most expensive paintings ever sold in the world.
So far, the most expensive painting was 鈥淪alvator Mundi鈥 by Leonardo da Vinci for an astounding $450.3 million in 2017. Created around the end of the 15th century, da Vinci鈥檚 portrait of Jesus Christ was thought to be a copy of the original painting until it was rediscovered and restored in 2011.
Other famous paintings, including Pablo Picasso鈥檚 鈥淟es Femmes d鈥橝lger鈥 and Amedeo Modigliani鈥檚 鈥淣u couch茅鈥 both sold for over $170 million in separate 2015 auctions.
The most recent painting to make the top 10 was Claude Monet鈥檚 鈥淢eules鈥, which sold at Sotheby鈥檚 auction house for $110.7 million in May of 2019.
Historical context, originality, skill and fame of the artist are just a few of the many reasons for why a piece of art is valued the way it is. Most buyers of these enormously priced paintings treat them as concrete investments, hoping their value will increase as the years go by.
