A monochrome painting by renowned French artist Yves Klein sold for 18.4 million euros ($20 million) at a Christie's auction in Paris on Thursday, setting a new record for the artist in France. The massive blue artwork, titled "California (IKB 71)," measures nearly two meters high and more than four meters wide, making it one of Klein's most monumental pieces ever offered at auction.
The painting was created by Klein in Paris in 1961 and was being auctioned for the first time. Christie's described the work as being "among the most important works by Yves Klein ever offered on the market," though the auction house did not reveal the identity of the buyer. The monochrome blue canvas was painted using Klein's signature technique, combining pure pigment with synthetic resin to achieve his distinctive color.
According to Christie's, this particular work "finds its equivalent in size only in the gigantic panels created for the Musiktheater im Revier in Gelsenkirchen, Germany," which measure five to seven meters in length. The painting had passed through several collections since its creation and was last displayed to the general public at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York as part of a long-term loan from 2005 to 2008.
The artwork had been held in a private American collection until the auction. The monochrome represents what made Klein famous before his death in 1962 at age 34: his deep ultramarine blue color, enhanced by an original process and named IKB, standing for International Klein Blue. Klein once explained his fascination with this distinctive hue, saying, "What pleased me above all was the pure pigments in powder form, as I often saw them at wholesale color merchants."
"They had an extraordinary brilliance and life of their own," Klein wrote in "L'aventure monochrome" (The Monochrome Adventure). "It was truly color in itself. The living and tangible colored material." The California (IKB 71) served as the centerpiece of Christie's "Avant-Garde(s) including Thinking Italian" sale, which also featured works by Auguste Renoir, Jean Dubuffet, and Alberto Giacometti.
