Gustav Klimt’s “Portrait of Miss Rieser” is a painting of a young woman left unfinished by the Austrian artist upon his death, despite unanswered questions about its subject matter and previous owners. Despite this, it sold at auction on Wednesday for $32 million.
Auction house Im Kinski said the work was long thought lost, but had actually hung in a private villa near Vienna for decades.
Im Kinski estimated its value at between 30 million and 50 million euros. (1 dollar = 0.9355 euro).
The piece depicts what appears to be a teenage girl in a turquoise dress with a flowing floral print against a red background, her alabaster skin and piercing pale brown eyes contrasts with her dark curly hair.
Despite this clear portrayal of her, it remains unclear who “Fräulein Rieser” actually is.
The brothers Adolf and Justus Rieser were wealthy businessmen from the Austro-Hungarian Empire who made their fortune by making twine from hemp and hemp.
Henriette Amalie Rieser-Landau, known as “Lily,” was married to Justus until their divorce in 1905 and became famous as a patron of the arts.
It is possible that she commissioned the painting of one of her daughters, or that Adolf Rieser painted it with his daughter Margarete as its subject.
“According to the latest provenance research, Klimt’s model was probably not Lily Rieser’s niece Margarethe Constance Rieser, but one of her two daughters (with Justus), the eldest of whom was born in 1898. Either Helene or her sister Annie, who was born in 1898 and was three years younger,” the auction house said on its website.
This painting was supposed to have been in Klimt’s studio after his death in 1918, but it is unclear what happened to it, especially in 1938, when Nazi Germany annexed Austria and the country’s What happened to the Jews after they were persecuted and sent to concentration camps remains unknown.
Margarete left Austria for Hungary and then England, but the auction house insists the painting never left Austria.
Lily Reaser remained in Vienna until she was deported in 1942 and was murdered at Auschwitz the following year.
After World War II, the daughters returned to Vienna to recover their property, but the painting was not mentioned in any documents, Im Kinski said.
“These many ambiguities and historical gaps have prompted the current owners to reach out to the legal heirs of the Rieser family and discuss a ‘fair and just resolution’ with all of them in 2023,” Im Kinski said. “This led to the agreement,” he said, without disclosing the current owner. .
“It has been agreed not to disclose the contents of the contract. However, we can say that all possible claims of all parties involved will be resolved and fulfilled through the auction of the artwork.”
“This agreement essentially states that, from a purely legal perspective, it does not matter who commissioned the painting from Gustav Klimt or which of the three young women in question is depicted. means.”
