Masterpieces by Klimt, Matisse and Freud set for London’s most valuable auction

A major group of masterpieces by some of modern art’s biggest names is to be auctioned by Sotheby’s in what is expected to be the most valuable collection ever offered in London.The works, consigned by Joe Lewis and his daughter Vivienne – whose family owns Tottenham Hotspur – include paintings by Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Amedeo Modigliani, Francis Bacon, Henri Matisse, Chaïm Soutine, Lucian Freud, and Gustave Caillebotte. Sotheby’s said the group is expected to realise more than £150m.Combined with other works coming to the market in June, the sale could make this the highest value week of auctions ever staged in London.Egon Schiele’s Danaë is estimated to fetch £12-18m – a new artist record. Photograph: Sotheby’sOliver Barker, Sotheby’s Europe chair, told the Guardian the collection showed a rare “concentration of museum-calibre masterpieces” and was especially strong in modern figurative painting. “Many haven’t been seen on the market for decades – if at all – which speaks to both their rarity and art-historical significance,” he said.He described the auction as “one for the history books”. It follows last September’s sale of the Pauline Karpidas collection, which made £101m and became the highest-value single-owner sale staged in London. Barker said the auction was “a real turning point” that helped revive confidence in the global art market.“The sale was tangible evidence that collectors around the world are deeply inspired by collections built from a singular vision, steeped in coherence, rarity, and history,” he said.Gustav Klimt’s Bildnis Gertrud Loew (Gertha Felsőványi). Photograph: Sotheby’sHighlights from the Lewis collection will be exhibited in New York and London before the June sales.Among the leading lots is a full-length society portrait by Klimt, Bildnis Gertrud Loew (Gertha Felsőványi) from 1902, which is estimated to fetch £20-30m. The subject was one of the artist’s patrons, from who the painting was stolen by the Nazis when they arrived in Vienna. In recent years it has hung alongside other Klimt works at Neue Galerie.When first shown at the Vienna Secession’s Klimt exhibition in 1903, the critic Ludwig Hevesi described the painting as “the most sweet-scented poetry the palette is able to create”. Sotheby’s said only five major Klimt portraits have come to auction in the past 25 years, each exceeding its top estimate.Also for sale is Schiele’s , painted when the artist was just 19, and which demonstrates the skills that came to define him. It is estimated to fetch £12-18m, breaking the previous record for a Schiele work.Other highlights include Modigliani’s Homme à la pipe (Le notaire de Nice), unseen for almost half a century and estimated at £12-18m, and a rare double self-portrait by Bacon from 1977, estimated at £8-12m.Lewis was born and raised in London’s East End, where he developed a passion for the School of London painters, including Bacon and Freud. That early passion became the foundation of one of the world’s most significant private collections of modern art, shaped by a fascination with the human figure in all its forms.Amedeo Modigliani’s Homme à la pipe (Le notaire de Nice) has not been seen for 50 years. Photograph: Sotheby’sBarker said bringing the works to London was a “full‑circle moment”, adding that the collection would be presented with “all the care, attention and fanfare that its importance commands”.The June auction follows the sale of four School of London works from the Lewis Collection at Sotheby’s in March, which made £35.8m – double their combined low estimate.A spokesperson for the Lewis Collection said the family had always been drawn to art that “reflects what it means to be human”, and welcomed the strong response to the March sale as a sign of “the enduring power of figurative painting”.