Churchill wartime painting sells for US$9.75m
Print Edition
A PAINTING of Marrakesh by Britain鈥檚 famed wartime prime minister Winston Churchill, owned by Hollywood star Angelina Jolie, smashed expectations to sell for 7 million pounds (US$9.75 million) at auction in London on Monday.
Churchill, a keen artist, took inspiration from the Moroccan city and painted 鈥淭he Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque鈥 oil work during a World War II visit in 1943.
He gave the finished article to fellow wartime leader, US President Franklin Roosevelt. Auction house Christie鈥檚 called the painting 鈥淐hurchill鈥檚 most important work.鈥
鈥淎side from its distinguished provenance, it is the only landscape he made鈥 during the war.
After frenzied bidding, much of it carried out over the phone, the gavel eventually came down at 7 million pounds, smashing the pre-sale expectations of 1.5 to 2.5 million pounds.
Christie鈥檚 said the sale figure with commission was 8.2 million pounds.
Two more of his paintings also went under the hammer. The three works together fetched 43 million pounds.
A career army officer before entering politics, Churchill started to paint 40. His passion for the translucent light of Marrakesh, far from the political storms and drab skies of London, dates to the 1930s when most of Morocco was a French protectorate.
He made six visits to the North African country over 23 years.
鈥淗ere in these spacious palm groves rising from the desert the traveller can be sure of perennial sunshine ... and can contemplate with ceaseless satisfaction the stately and snow-clad panorama of the Atlas Mountains,鈥 he wrote.
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