13 Picasso works bought for £113m by one London buyer

A London art adviser has spent more than £110m bulk buying 13 works of art by Picasso on behalf of unnamed wealthy clients.

Harry Smith, executive chairman and managing director of the art advisory firm Gurr Johns, bought four Picasso works, including a 1937 portrait of the artist’s lover Marie-Thérèse Walter for £49.8m, at a Sotheby’s auction in London on Wednesday night.

The purchases came a day after Smith bought nine of the Spanish artist’s works at a Christie’s auction – all the Picasso lots available. In total Smith spent £113m on Picasso pieces this week.

Smith declined to comment on the identity of the client for whom he bought the works but said the art world was in the midst of a fresh love affair with Picasso. Interest in the artist, who died in 1973 at the age of 91, has also been boosted by Tate Modern’s forthcoming show Picasso 1932: Love, Fame, Tragedy, the gallery’s first solo exhibition of the artist’s work.


Source : theguardian