A nude paint that is the largest produced by Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani sold for $157.2 million in New York on Monday night, becoming the fourth most expensive work of art sold at auction.
Painted a century ago, Modigliani’s masterpiece “Nu couche (sur le cote gauche)” fetched the highest price in Sotheby’s history and was the star single lot in the May art auction season in New York.
Modigliani follows Leonardo da Vinci and Pablo Picasso as the third highest-selling artist at auction. Monday’s sale failed to eclipse the $170.4 million paid for another Modigliani nude at Christie’s in 2015. Nearly 58 inches (147 centimeters) wide, the picture was the cover star of a recent retrospective at the Tate Modern gallery in London.
