'He didn't want to die': Family of Calgary man killed in standoff speaks out
Family of a Calgary man killed after a 30-hour standoff with police last week are speaking out, sharing details of the tense and heart-wrenching experience.
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.
Family of a Calgary man killed after a 30-hour standoff with police last week are speaking out, sharing details of the tense and heart-wrenching experience.
A family doctor in Toronto has been suspended for three months after a disciplinary tribunal found that he failed to follow proper protocols while examining a patient's breasts and made inappropriate comments about her body.
An Ohio mother whose 16-month-old daughter died after being left home alone in a playpen for 10 days last summer while she went on vacation was sentenced Monday to life in prison with no chance of parole.
In a Barrie courtroom on Monday, a retired high school teacher from the Niagara Region pleaded guilty to sexual touching and obtaining sexual services from a 15-year-old boy in Collingwood in 2021.
The company, which announced in January it was selling 20,000 of the electric vehicles in its fleet, or about a third of the EVs it owned, is now replacing the CEO who helped build up that fleet, giving it the company’s fifth boss in just four years.
Calgary police have charged five men in a pair of kidnappings last year that targeted innocent victims.
The demand for total solar eclipse glasses used to safely view the rare celestial event has been ramping up as sellers, along with astronomy and eye-care experts in Canada, warn that viewing the eclipse with the naked eye is dangerous.
A Canadian-born commander of the so-called Norman Brigade, a volunteer fighting group in Ukraine, has died.
Moose Jaw police say an 18-year-old woman who was at work has died from injuries she sustained in a collision with a vehicle being driven by her co-worker last Thursday.