Modigliani’s Paulette fetches a whopping $42 million in New York

Amedeo Modigliani’s Paulette Jourdain, painted in 1919, sold for a final price of $42 million and was the star of the first Sotheby’s auction of collector Alfred Taubman legacy on Wednesday night in New York.

The richlycolored, Cubistinspired portrait of the housemaid and lover of art dealer Leopold Zborowski is often compared to Mona Lisa, given the charisma of the women in the two paintings, staring fixedly ahead with enigmatic smiles.

Modigliani’s Paulette was a favorite of Taubman, a former owner of Sotheby’s who died last spring at the age of 91.

Although the painting surpassed preauction estimates, the first fall auction of the New Yorkbased Sotheby’s did not fare as well in bids for works by other artists, including Pablo Picasso, Mark Rothko, Joan Miro and Edgar Degas.

Picasso’s Woman Seated on a Chair (1938), a portrait of the artist’s lover Dora Maar completed a year after Guernica, was sold for $20 million, below the minimum estimate of $25 million.

The painting went to the private collection of fashion designer Gianni Versace’s family, Sotheby’s said.

Joan Miro’s La Porte (Objet) from 1931, one of the most iconoclastic works of the artist, fetched $11.7 million, well below the expected $1520 million.

Edgar Degas’s Danseuses en Blanc (1878), estimated at $18 million, only managed to fetch $15 million.

Meanwhile, Vincent Van Gogh’s Jardin Public A Arles (1888), also sold for a lowerthanexpected $1.3 million (it was estimated to bring in at least $1.8 million).

The works of American painter of Latvian descent Mark Rothko, Orange on Wine and Lavender and Green, also sold below estimate for $18 million and $15 million.

Francis Beacon’s Man with Arm Raised sold for the expected $9 million.

The bidding for the collector’s legacy will continue Thursday with other impressionist and modern art works on sale, including Picasso’s La Gommeuse, estimated at $60 million, and Claude Monet’s Water Lillies, which could be sold for $50 million.