Art market records
The Most Expensive Classic Paintings Ever Sold
The originals change hands for hundreds of millions. A hand-painted reproduction lets you live with the same composition, colour and brushwork for a tiny fraction of that.
Prices are nominal amounts at the time of sale. Private-sale figures are as reported in the press and were not officially confirmed.
- 1
Salvator Mundi
Leonardo da Vinci · sold 2017
$450.3 million
Christie's, New York — the highest price ever paid for a painting at auction.
Own a hand-painted copy → - 2Request this painting
The Card Players
Paul Cézanne · sold 2011
≈ $250 million (reported)
Private sale of one of the five versions of Cézanne's card-players series.
- 3
When Will You Marry?
Paul Gauguin · sold 2014
≈ $210 million (reported)
Private sale of the Tahitian painting Nafea Faa Ipoipo.
Own a hand-painted copy → - 4Request this painting
Portraits of Maerten Soolmans and Oopjen Coppit
Rembrandt van Rijn · sold 2016
€160 million
Pair of wedding portraits bought jointly by the Louvre and the Rijksmuseum.
- 5
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer II
Gustav Klimt · sold 2016
≈ $150 million (reported)
Private sale of Klimt's second portrait of Adele.
Own a hand-painted copy → - 6Request this painting
Les Poseuses (small version)
Georges Seurat · sold 2022
$149.2 million
Christie's, New York — sold from the collection of Paul G. Allen.
- 7
Mont Sainte-Victoire
Paul Cézanne · sold 2022
$137.8 million
Christie's, New York — one of Cézanne's views of his beloved mountain.
Own a hand-painted copy → - 8
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I
Gustav Klimt · sold 2006
$135 million
The 'Golden Adele', bought for the Neue Galerie, New York.
Own a hand-painted copy → - 9Request this painting
Orchard with Cypresses
Vincent van Gogh · sold 2022
$117.2 million
Christie's, New York — a record for Van Gogh at auction.
- 10Request this painting
Haystacks
Claude Monet · sold 2019
$110.7 million
Sotheby's, New York — a record for any Impressionist work at the time.
- 11Request this painting
Lady with a Fan
Gustav Klimt · sold 2023
≈ $108.8 million (£85.3 million)
Sotheby's, London — a record for any artwork sold in Europe.
- 12Request this painting
Birch Forest
Gustav Klimt · sold 2022
$104.6 million
Christie's, New York — a Klimt landscape from the Paul G. Allen collection.
- 13Request this painting
Portrait of Dr. Gachet
Vincent van Gogh · sold 1990
$82.5 million
Christie's, New York — the most expensive painting in the world for over a decade.
- 14
Bal du moulin de la Galette
Pierre-Auguste Renoir · sold 1990
$78.1 million
Sotheby's, New York — the smaller version of Renoir's Montmartre dance.
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Massacre of the Innocents
Peter Paul Rubens · sold 2002
≈ $76.7 million (£49.5 million)
Sotheby's, London — a record for an Old Master at the time.