Claude Monet Masterpiece Sells for €50 Million to Set All-Time French Auction Record at Sotheby’s Paris

A magnificent painting by Claude Monet shattered auction records in France on Thursday, selling for €50 million—equivalent to approximately $56.2 million—at Sotheby’s in Paris. The remarkable sale not only eclipsed the previous high-water mark for any artwork ever sold at auction on French soil, but it also served as the crown jewel of a historic white-glove evening sale that thoroughly outperformed expectations across the board.

The undisputed centerpiece of the event was Monet’s vibrant and evocative 19th-century canvas, Iris. The painting immediately ignited a dramatic and protracted 45-minute bidding war that unfolded between six deeply committed collectors vying for the masterpiece. Intensity mounted inside the salesroom and across international telephone lines before the work was ultimately hammered down to a private collector in Asia. The winning bidder was represented on the phone by Jen Hua, Sotheby’s deputy chairman.

Long before the hammer fell, industry experts had anticipated robust interest, though the final result far outstripped initial financial projections. Sotheby’s had placed a pre-sale estimate on Iris ranging between €22 million and €30 million. The soaring competition ultimately drove the price well past those figures, underscoring the enduring global market appetite for Monet’s finest works, particularly pieces with exceptional provenance and historical significance.

The extraordinary sale of Iris anchored an entire evening dedicated to dispersing works from the esteemed collection of Jeanne Schlumberger, whose family accumulated its substantial fortune within the oil services industry. The auction achieved a flawless 100 percent sell-through rate, with every single lot finding a buyer. By the time the final lot was hammered down, the evening’s cumulative total reached €74.4 million, or roughly $83.7 million. This historic sum established a new benchmark, marking the highest grossing fine art auction ever held at Sotheby’s Paris. Demonstrating the profound depth of buyer demand, nearly three-quarters of all the lots offered during the evening sold above their high pre-sale estimates.

While the broader collection performed exceptionally well, Monet’s works were responsible for the lion’s share of the financial fireworks and collector fervor. A second major Monet painting, titled Saule pleureur ou L’Arbre de feu and depicting one of the iconic weeping willows that famously inhabited his pastoral garden at Giverny, achieved a stellar €9.7 million, or about $10.9 million. Two additional paintings by the pioneering Impressionist master further bolstered the evening’s staggering totals: La Seine à Vernon, Arbres, painted in 1894, brought in €4.3 million ($4.8 million), while La Maison à Travers les Roses added another €2.5 million ($2.9 million) to the ledger.

These four monumental Monet canvases shared a fascinating and remarkably well-preserved history. Following the artist’s death, the paintings passed directly from Claude Monet to his son, Michel Monet. They were subsequently acquired by the prominent art dealer Katia Granoff before eventually finding a permanent home within the Schlumberger family collection. Remarkably, the paintings had remained carefully guarded in private hands for decades, shielding them from the public eye and heightening their allure when they finally re-emerged for public sale.

Jeanne Schlumberger began assembling her formidable art collection in earnest during the 1950s. During this pivotal era, she worked in close collaboration with dealer Katia Granoff, operating at a time when Monet’s late-period works—which are now universally celebrated and fiercely contested by top-tier collectors—were not nearly as fashionable or commercially revered as they are today. Historical records indicate that in 1958, Schlumberger likely helped finance Granoff’s direct acquisition of works originating straight from Michel Monet’s studio. This financial backing granted the dealer unprecedented access to a trove of paintings that would eventually come to be recognized as some of the most sought-after and influential creations of the artist’s late career.

While the Monet offerings delivered record-shattering excitement, the evening was also defined by a notable high-profile withdrawal. The collection originally featured three early paintings by Paul Cézanne, works that many anticipated would generate significant institutional and private competition. However, those paintings never made it to the auction block. On Thursday, Sotheby’s announced that the Cézanne works had been officially withdrawn from the sale following intensive discussions between the Schlumberger family and the city of Aix-en-Provence, which was Cézanne’s cherished hometown.

The municipal government of Aix-en-Provence now intends to acquire the paintings directly so they can be housed within the Musée Granet, with vital financial and logistical support provided by France’s Ministry of Culture. The withdrawal followed the recent designation of the three paintings as official French national treasures, a legal status designed to protect vital cultural heritage from leaving the country or disappearing into opaque private collections.

Despite the absence of the Cézanne canvases, there was an abundance of intense market action spanning other legendary French artists throughout the evening. Pierre Bonnard’s captivating painting La Cueillette des Prunes, which notably had not been exhibited publicly since 1956, became another major star of the sale. It commanded €2.5 million ($2.9 million), a figure more than three times its €800,000 high estimate, thereby establishing a new auction record for the artist within France.

The momentum continued with works on paper and sculpture. A mesmerizing work on paper by Gustave Moreau titled Rêve d’Orient brought in €1.4 million ($1.6 million), successfully setting a brand-new auction record for a drawing by the visionary Symbolist artist. Meanwhile, Camille Claudel’s evocative bronze cast sculpture from 1905, La Valse, realized €832,000 ($935,000), effortlessly doubling its conservative low estimate.

The blockbuster evening served as an exceptionally strong and high-profile launchpad for Sotheby’s autumn sales series in Paris. The auction house’s calendar was slated to continue on Friday with a fresh slate of dedicated sales focusing heavily on modern art and Surrealism, building upon the extraordinary momentum generated by the historic Schlumberger collection dispersal. All reported sale prices throughout the landmark event included the standard buyer’s premiums.