OFF THE BLOCK

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L’Empire des Lumières by René Magritte

Bidding commences on 2 March through Sotheby’s in London

Due to make its long-awaited market debut at Sotheby’s Modern & Contemporary Evening Auction in London, this 1961 work by René Magritte will be offered with an estimate in excess of US$60 million. It is considered one of the most desirable works of modern art still remaining in private hands, having been painted for the daughter of Magritte’s patron – the Belgian surrealist collector Pierre Crowet – and has remained in the family ever since. So arresting is the painting’s visual power that it is seen as a definitive image of surrealist art, going so far as to inspire a scene in the 1973 film The Exorcist.