A famous painting by Winston Churchill was sold Monday in London for £7 million (€8.1 million) by Christie's auction house, making it the most expensive painting by the former British Prime Minister to sell at auction.
"The Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque" (1943), painted on an official visit during the Second World War, far exceeded the estimated sale price of between €1.7 to €2.8 million.
The oil on canvas offered for sale by the American actress Angelina Jolie is considered "to be Sir Winston Churchill's most important painting" because of its "imbrication in the history of the 20th century," British art historian Barry Phipps stressed in the catalogue.
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Churchill gave it as a gift to US President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II at the time. It was then sold by one of Roosevelt's sons in the 1950s, after which the painting changed hands several times before landing in 2011 in the collection of the Hollywood couple Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt.
Another painting by Churchill also sold far above estimates. A landscape of Marrakech sold for £1.55 million (1.8 million euros) when it was estimated at between £300,000 and £500,000.
The Brussels Times
