$92.2m for Botticelli

NEW YORK: A small painting by Botticelli — one of just three portraits in private hands by the artist best known for The Birth of Venus — has sold at Sotheby’s in New York for $US92.2 million ($NZ128.83 million), an auction record for the Renaissance master.

The work, Young Man Holding A Roundel, from about 1475, depicts a young nobleman holding a round painting of a saint.

‘‘This is not only an exceptional painting, it is also the epitome of beauty, and of a moment when so much of our Western civilisation began,’’ said Christopher Apostle, head of Sotheby’s Old Masters Painting department in New

York. ‘‘Today’s result is a fitting tribute, both to the painting itself and all that it represents.’’

The seller was the estate of the late real estate billionaire Sheldon Solow, who bought the work at Christie’s in 1982 for $US810,000. Two bidders competed for the painting at yesterday’s livestreamed auction. Sotheby’s did not disclose the identity of the buyer.

Sotheby’s exhibited Young Man Holding A Roundel in London, Dubai, Los Angeles and New York before the sale.

The price was the most for an old master work since Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi hit $US450 million in 2017. — AAP