The Art Newspaper | CRISTINA RUIZ and ANNA BRADY
The sale of Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi for $450m (including fees) at Christie’s New York on 15 November shattered every record for art prices. Since then, speculation about the identity of the buyer has ranged from Chinese billionaires to the Microsoft co-founder and Leonardo Codex collector Bill Gates; from French government officials for Abu Dhabi to the Qatari royal family and even, among conspiracy theorists in the darker corners of the internet, President Vladimir Putin.
One less fantastical suggestion is that the buyer is Ken Griffin, who set up the global investment firm Citadel. Multiple sources suggest that Griffin planned to lend or donate the work to the Art Institute of Chicago…read more
Images | Christie’s Images Ltd 2017