There's actually no such thing as vegetables. Here's why you should eat them anyway
The rumours are true: Vegetables aren't real — that is, in botany, anyway.
A selection of 11 Pablo Picasso works have been auctioned for a collective total of more than US$110 million, after being on display for years in a Las Vegas restaurant.
Part of the MGM Resorts Collection, the pieces were a hallmark of the Bellagio Hotel's Michelin-starred French and Spanish eatery "Picasso," which is inspired by the artist's life and work.
Coinciding with the artist's 140th birthday, MGM said the auction was the "largest and most significant" fine art sale ever to take place in Las Vegas. Organized by Sotheby's, it was the auction house's first evening marquee sale to take place outside New York.
The star attraction of Saturday's auction was "Femme au béret rouge-orange," or "Woman in a reddish-orange hat," a 1938 portrait of Picasso's lover and muse Marie-Thérèse Walter.
The Spanish artist's affair with Walter lasted from the late 1920s to the 1930s, and she gave birth to their daughter Maya in 1935. Picasso's portraits of Walter are characterized by vivid colors and a sense of intimacy.
Initially estimated to sell for between US$20 and US$30 million by Sotheby's, it was eventually auctioned off for more than US$40 million.
Picasso, who lived from 1881 until 1973 and spent much of his adult life in France, is often dubbed the founding father of the Cubist style of painting -- and "Femme au béret rouge-orange" bears some similarities to his famous later portraits of his lover Dora Maar.
The auction also featured two Cubist-inspired still life paintings from the early 1940s during World War II -- with "Nature morte au panier de fruits et aux fleurs" selling for US$16.6 million, while "Nature morte aux fleurs et au compotier" sold for US$8.3 million.
Meanwhile, "Homme et enfant," or "Man and child," which Sotheby's said reflected his later spontaneous style and his role as a father, sold for just over US$24 million.
However, it was the less high-profile works that hugely exceeded their estimates, with the 1962 painted terracotta "Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe" -- inspired by Edouard Manet's 1863 painting of the same name -- selling for over four times its highest valuation.
The auction also included a sculpted white pitcher with three faces carved onto its surface. The work, produced by Picasso in 1954, was valued at between US$60,000 and US$80,000 but sold for US$315,000.
Some works also revealed intimate details about Picasso's life and work -- with a ceramic tile showing the window of his workshop "La Californie," which overlooked the sea in the southern French city of Cannes.
In an August press release, MGM said the auction would help in "deepening diversity and inclusion" within its art collection. Some of the proceeds will be invested back into the art market, according to Sotheby's.
An MGM spokesperson said via Sotheby's that the group's collection still contains 12 other Picasso artworks that will replace the auctioned items at the Bellagio's "Picasso" restaurant.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved.
The rumours are true: Vegetables aren't real — that is, in botany, anyway.
Israeli tanks seized control of Gaza’s vital Rafah border crossing on Tuesday as Israel brushed off urgent warnings from close allies and moved into the southern city even as ceasefire negotiations with Hamas remained on a knife’s edge.
The Met Gala and its fashionista A-listers on Monday included Jennifer Lopez, Zendaya and a parade of others in a swirl of flora and fauna looks on a green-tinged carpet lined by live foliage.
A daily spoonful of olive oil could lower your risk of dying from dementia, according to a new study by Harvard scientists.
As Canadians brace themselves for summer temperatures, forecasters say a weakening El Nino cycle doesn’t mean relief from the heat.
Defence lawyers of Jeremy Skibicki have admitted in court the accused killed four Indigenous women, but argues he is not criminally responsible for the deaths by way of mental disorder – this latest development has triggered a judge-alone trial rather than a jury trial.
The owner of three Calgary dogs that got loose and mauled a woman to death in 2022 has been ordered to pay a $15,000 fine within one year and banned from owning any animal for 15 years.
Some Ontarians are expressing frustration after they said that they were removed from their family doctor’s patient list for visiting a walk-in clinic in a process being called “de-rostering.”
Residents in Ottawa’s Elmridge Gardens complex are dealing with a rat infestation that just won’t go away. Now, after doing everything they can to try to fix the issue, they are pleading with the city to step in and help.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.