Bloomberg Businessweek - USA (2021-02-08)

the painting’s temporary export license,
he says, the price was suppressed. It failed
to find a buyer.
Despite that setback, Orsi stridently supports
the valuation of Young Man Holding a Roundel. “If
you want another one like this, you could steal it from a
museum,” he says, “but there aren’t any others.”
It’s an argument that surely resonated with the work’s
buyer, whose identity is still unknown as of press time, though
art world whispers suggest it could be a Russian oligarch.
During the bidding, Sotheby’s auctioneer Oliver Barker, set
up in the house’s streaming-audience-only stage set, opened
at $70 million. Only two bidders—both on the phone to auc-
tion house specialists—stepped up to the plate; one seemed to
back down after a single bid. It still took four minutes for the
hammer to fall as Barker attempted to coax the collector back

into the fray. The total certainly was “in excess of $80 million,”

as Sotheby’s predicted, but not much more than that.

This wasn’t great news for Coll, who’d bet that it would

sell for $200 million and is now on the hook for a very expen-

sive meal. “It’s going to be 10 people at a good restaurant,”

he says. “At one point I was thinking I should bid for the

painting, because it’s going to be cheaper than the dinner.”

Still, he says, it could be worse. “If it went unsold, I would

still have to pay, and we’d have nothing to celebrate. Because

if the old masters world can still produce $100 million sales,

that makes me happy.”

4,999 Luxuries for the

Price of a Masterpiece

What else can you purchase

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2,580

Bottlesof Bowmore’s

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Start by buying up the

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645

Bottles of 2017 Domaine

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The ultrarare Romanée-Conti

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391

Bitcoin

f thecryptocurrency tanks, you’d

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325

Birkin bags

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trying to could bumpyouto

the front of theline.

From $9,850each

29

Ferrari F8 Tributos

The most beautiful

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$270,530 each

Rolex Datejust

watches

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$

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Private island

End your spree with this

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It includes a 1,700-square-foot

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ually

t just

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.

If

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