Old Master fetches $28 million

An Old Master painting by Andrea Mantegna sold at auction Thursday for $28.56 million.

“Descent Into Limbo,” painted around 1492, was purchased by an anonymous telephone bidder, said Sotheby’s spokeswoman Lauren Gioia.

The painting depicts Christ descending into limbo to liberate the souls of the righteous. The early Italian Renaissance work is believed to have been commissioned by Mantegna’s greatest patron, the Marquis Ludovico III Gonzaga.

Before Thursday, the most paid at auction for a work by Mantegna was $10.4 million for his “Adoration of the Magi” in 1985; it now hangs in the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles.