Gustav Klimt artwork of Jewish woman sells for record £181 million

A Gustav Klimt portrait of a Jewish woman who survived the Holocaust by telling the Nazis that the celebrated artist was her father has become the most valuable work of modern art to ever sell at auction.

Following a twenty minute war between six bidders at Sotheby’s global headquarters in New York’s Breuer Building, and to gasps and cheers from the audience, the 6-foot oil-on-canvas “Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer,” one of just two full-length Klimts in private hands, reached $236.4, or £181 million (with fees).

Painted between 1914 and 1916, the portrait of Elisabeth in an East Asian emperor’s cloak, set a record for any work ever sold at the auction house.

Elisabeth Lederer was the daughter of a prominent Jewish Viennese family, who were among Klimt’s greatest patrons. The painting was part of the Lederer collection seized by the Nazis in 1938 after they annexed Austria; they left the family portraits, which, according to the National Gallery of Canada where the painting was previously on loan, were considered “too Jewish” to be worth stealing.

To escape Nazi persecution, Elisabeth circulated the false story that Klimt, who had died in 1918, was her real father. Elisabeth’s mother, Szerena, signed an affidavit attesting Klimt’s paternity to save her daughter.

Elisabeth Lederer died from illness in 1944. In 1948, the portrait was returned to her brother, Erich Lederer, as part of post-war restitution efforts.

In 1985, it was purchased by Leonard A. Lauder, heir to the Estée Lauder multinational cosmetics company, who died earlier this year.

The sale beat out a previous record set by a Andy Warhol work in 2022.

In 2006, Lauder’s brother Ronald paid $135m (£103m) in a private sale, rather than at auction, for Klimt’s famous Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer 1, widely known as Woman in Gold. It is currently housed in the Neue Galerie in New York, which was co-founded by Lauder.

In 2023, Klimt’s final completed portrait, “Dame mit Fächer” (Lady with a Fan),” sold for $108.4 million or £83 million.

Sotheby’s has declined to identify the successful buyer of the painting.