Frida Kahlo’s ‘Diego y Yo’ smashes records at Sotheby’s
New York, Nov 16 (EFE).- Mexican artist Frida Kahlo’s self-portrait “Diego y Yo” (Diego and I) on Tuesday smashed records at auction in New York, setting her own personal auction high as well as that for a Latin American artist, when it sold for $34.9 million.
The sale quadrupled the painter’s previous public auction record of $8 million, achieved in 2016.
The small work – 30 centimeters high and 22.4 cm wide – was completed in 1949, five years before her death.The piece, last sold three decades ago, symbolizes the tempestuous relationship between Kahlo and artist Diego Rivera, who appears with a third eye on Kahlo’s forehead.
“Tonight’s outstanding result further secures her place in the auction echelon she belongs, as one of the true titans of 20th century art,” Julian Dawes, Sotheby’s senior vice president and co-head of impressionist and modern art, said in a statement.
Sotheby’s later tweeted that “Diego y Yo” was “acquired by the Eduardo F. Costantini Collection, a renowned collector with a longstanding commitment to supporting Latin American art and artists, and founder of Malba, Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires.”
The painting not only smashed the artist’s previous record, but also become the most expensive work by a Latin American artist ever sold at auction, surpassing Rivera’s “Los Rivales” (The Rivals), which was sold at Christie’s for $9.8 million in 2018.
In addition, “Diego y Yo” made history the last time it went up for auction in 1990, when it sold for $1.4 million – the first time that $1 million was exceeded in a bid for a Latin American artist’s work.
Before the sale, Sotheby’s estimated that it would sell for $30-50 million. EFE
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