Hovhannes (Ivan) Aivazovsky’s painting the Bay of Naples (1878) fetched d 2,3 million pounds ($2,9) in an online auction at Sotheby’s.
The painting was initially estimated at 800,000 – 1,200,000 GBP, according to the auction’s website.
At over two meters wide it is one of the largest paintings by Aivazovsky to appear on the open market and is instantly recognizable as a work by his hand.
It combines many of the elements for which he is best known and which continue to resonate with the public today, more than a century after the artist’s death.
These include the diffuse sunlight filling a hazy sky which here occupies two thirds of the canvas, and the reflection of light on the calm, only slightly rippling water.
Another painting by Aivazovsky – the Passing Ship on a Moonlight Night (1868) – sold for 435 thousand pounds ($236,000).
