South African born artist and portrait painter, Marlene Dumas has set a new global record for the most expensive art sold by a living female artist.
Her Miss January oil painting which she reportedly created back in 1997 at the tender age of 10 depicting a semi-nude blonde model posing upright, was bought by an anonymous bidder at the Christie’s Auction in New York for a whopping $13.6 million (R246.7m).
The British auction house sought to expand on some of the inspirations behind Dumas’ creativity on the artwork.
“Dumas started exploring and scrutinising the female form at the age of 10, with a drawing called Miss World, which depicted idolised glamour models.
Over 30 years later, she returned to the subject with Miss January (1997), a portrait that threads the lien between revealing and concealing and serves perhaps the best example of her influential female portraiture,” Christie’s auction wrote on its Instagram account.
Marlene’s art seeks to invoke emotions and spark awareness on various topics including sexuality, violence and race among others.
Her latest record surpasses that of Egland’s contemporary painter, Jenny Saville who sold her Propped self-portrait for about $12.4 million back in 2018.
