Whatifs › Stories, updated 12 October 2026
The most expensive paintings ever sold
The most expensive painting ever sold is Salvator Mundi, attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, which fetched 450.3 million dollars at Christie’s New York in November 2017. Behind it come private sales reported around 250 to 300 million dollars, and Warhol’s Shot Sage Blue Marilyn at 195 million at auction.
Whatifs › Articles, updated 12 October 2026
The auction boards on Whatifs are invented. The real ones are hardly less extravagant. Here are the record sales that set the scale, with an important caveat: private sales are reported by the press, not published, so their figures are estimates.
The top sales
| Painting | Artist | Price (USD) | Sale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Salvator Mundi | Attributed to Leonardo da Vinci | 450.3 million | Christie’s New York, November 2017 |
| Interchange | Willem de Kooning | About 300 million | Private sale, 2015 |
| The Card Players | Paul Cézanne | About 250 million | Private sale, 2011 |
| Shot Sage Blue Marilyn | Andy Warhol | 195 million | Christie’s New York, May 2022 |
| Les Femmes d’Alger (Version O) | Pablo Picasso | 179.4 million | Christie’s New York, May 2015 |
Figures are nominal, without adjusting for inflation, and auction prices include the buyer’s premium.
Salvator Mundi: the record and the doubts
The painting of Christ holding a crystal orb had been dismissed as a later copy and sold for a small sum at a regional auction in the United States in 2005. Cleaned, restored and attributed to Leonardo, it was shown at the National Gallery in London in 2011, then sold at Christie’s in 2017 after a bidding war of about twenty minutes. Several specialists still question how much of it Leonardo painted himself, and the painting has not been shown in public since the sale.
That story, a dismissed copy turned into a record, is exactly the kind Whatifs borrows for its fiction.
Private sales: the numbers we do not see
The two biggest figures after Salvator Mundi come from private sales. Interchange, by de Kooning, was reportedly sold by David Geffen’s foundation to the investor Kenneth Griffin in 2015, along with a Pollock. The Card Players by Cézanne was reportedly bought by the royal family of Qatar in 2011. Neither price was officially confirmed. Gauguin’s Nafea Faa Ipoipo was long listed at around 210 million dollars, until a court case cast doubt on the reported figure.
Why the records keep climbing
- Scarcity. There are fewer than twenty paintings generally accepted as by Leonardo, and almost none in private hands.
- Fame. Buyers at this level are paying for a name and a story as much as for paint on canvas.
- The auction itself. A live sale with telephone bidders turns a price into an event; Christie’s marketed Salvator Mundi as "the last Leonardo".
Our boards show prices in six currencies and replay the bidding when you tap them. Those sales never happened: no buyer, no premium, no painting. The real records above are the reference that makes the game believable.
Old masters versus modern art
Most of the top prices go to modern and post-war art, simply because more of it is on the market. Old masters reach these heights only when a rare work surfaces, which is why rediscoveries cause such excitement. In 2019 a small Cimabue panel found in a French kitchen sold for about 24 million euros, a record for a medieval painting: read more in masterpieces found in attics and kitchens.
And if a "new record" for a painting you have never heard of goes viral, check it before you share it: how to spot an AI "lost masterpiece".
See today’s painting that never was
Frequently asked questions
What is the most expensive painting ever sold?
Salvator Mundi, attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, sold for 450.3 million dollars including fees at Christie’s New York on 15 November 2017.
Who bought Salvator Mundi?
The buyer was reported to be acting for the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman. The painting has not been exhibited publicly since the sale.
Are the auction prices on Whatifs real?
No. They are part of the fiction, like the paintings themselves.
Sources: List of most expensive paintings, Wikipedia ; Salvator Mundi (Leonardo), Wikipedia ; Rare Italian masterpiece found in French kitchen sold for 24 million, The Local.
Read next
- Real lost paintings: masterpieces that vanished
- How to spot an AI “lost masterpiece”
- Masterpieces found in attics and kitchens
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