Sotheby’s London Masterpiece Sale Earns Record-Setting $392.6 Million
7June 26, 2026
On what turned out to be a record-breaking night, Sotheby’sLondonachieved spectacular success with its Wednesday evening auction of treasures from the collection of billionaireJoe Lewis, ultimately bringing in £296.3 million ($392.6 million). 24 out of 25 lots sold, and big-ticket works from canonical artists made their mark: pieces from Degas, Monet, Modigliani and others made the Lewis sale the most valuable single-owner collection auction inLondon’s history.
After the Lewis sale, Sotheby’s London kept things rolling with a 40-lotModern and Contemporary Artevening sale that raked in £97.1 million ($128.1 million), bringing the night’s overall total for the auction house to £393.4 million ($520.7 million). According to Sotheby’s, this was the largest sum ever achieved at auction in a single night in Europe. During the Modern and Contemporary sale, Claude Monet’s dreamyNymphéassold for £40.8 million ($54 million).
“This was a perfect example of what London can do,” international contemporary art dealer Thaddaeus Ropac told the New York Times. “This was the best sale we’ve had here in years. It showed that if you offer great quality material people will go the extra mile.”
A spectacular nude by Modigliani, Nu assis au collier, was the top seller from the Lewis sale. Painted in 1917-1918 and depicting a woman tucking her hand sensually between her legs, the artwork, estimated to sell for over £45 million, ultimately fetched £48.2 million. In the same collection, René Magritte’s La Belle sold for £16 million, a sum that was around four times its upper estimate. The British painter Lucian Freud’s Sleeping by the Lion Carpet, a gorgeously fleshy rendition of a woman in repose, fetched £29.3 million.
Gustav Klimt’s Bildnis Gertrud Loew portrait sold for £36.2 million, while a bronze cast by Degas, Petite danseuse de quatorze ans, sold for £25.1 million. Lewis, a formidable collector, accumulated these masterpieces alongside his daughter Vivienne, an equally impassioned art enthusiast.
Lewis, who is based in the Bahamas and whose family is the majority shareholder of the Tottenham Hotspur soccer club of North London, was also accused of “brazen” insider trading by United States federal prosecutors in 2023. The next year, Lewis pled guilty to conspiring to commit securities fraud; in 2025, he was pardoned by President Trump.