gerhard richter’s painting abstraktes bild 1986 will headline sotheby’s upcoming evening sale of modern and contemporary art in london with an estimate in excess of £20 million us244 million measuring approximately 13by85 feet the painting features wavelike motion across the large canvas in blue yellow and red colors “reminiscent of a landscape or the strata of a monet waterlily painting” sotheby’s said the piece is one of the 24 largescale paintings from richter’s abstract series half of which are kept in museum collections around the world and is “one of the greatest monumental abstrakes bilder by gerhard richter remaining in private hands” james sevier sotheby’s european head of contemporary art said in a release when it last sold—to a private american collector in 2007 at sotheby’s new york for 97 million—it became the highestpriced abstract work by richter and the second highest price for the artist the auction house said the current auction record for the germanborn ritcher 90 one of the most commercially successful living artists was set by another abstraktes bild 1986 it sold for us463 million at a sotheby’s auction in 2015 in london the present painting to be offered on march 1 was created just two works apart from the record holder sotheby’s said prior to the auction the painting will be on a touring exhibition in miami through tuesday and new york jan 2427 followed by hong kong in early february and arriving in london on feb 22 several paintings from the abstraktes bild series fetched top dollar at auctions last year in may christie’s sold abstraktes bild 1994 which was once owned by musician eric clapton for us38 million sotheby’s hong kong sold abstraktes bild 1990 for hk172 million us255 million in october and the following month phillips hong kong sold abstraktes bild 7741 1992 for hk89 million this makes richter topperforming artist in hong kong in 2022 according to an analysis by arttactic