Salvator Mundi

Salvator Mundi was once thought to have been lost, vanishing from 1763 until 1900. During this period of obscurity, it was acquired by Sir Charles Robinson, who believed it to be a creation by Bernardino Luini, a disciple of Leonardo. Subsequently, the artwork reappeared on the scene at a Sotheby’s auction in England in 1958, garnering a sale price of £45, equivalent to around $125 at that time. Following this, it retreated from public view again until resurfacing at a minor auction house in the United States in 2005.

Similar to several of Leonardo’s extant pieces, the painting exhibited signs of wear when it emerged anew in the early 2000s. Substantial restoration efforts were essential to its revitalization. Despite skepticism from notable Renaissance art authorities regarding its attribution to Leonardo, the artwork found its way to an auction at Christie’s in New York in November 2017. There, it achieved an unprecedented milestone, being sold for $450,312,500—a fresh pinnacle in the realm of artwork valuation. The identity of the purchaser, however, remained undisclosed.