The Portrait of Kiki That Set Man Ray's Auction Record

Man Ray, Le Violon d'Ingres (1924), sold for $12.41m at Christie's in New York on May 14, 2022, becoming the most expensive photographic print to sell at auction.

The gelatin-silver print, flush-mounted on board, was printed by Ray himself and acquired directly from the artist in 1962. It is signed and dated in ink "Man Ray 1924", and stamped in red ink "ORIGINAL".

Man Ray, who was born Emmanuel Radnitzky, created the Surreal image of his model and lover Alice Prin, better known as Kiki de Montparnasse, wearing a turban and earrings, her bare back imprinted with a violin's f-holes in 1924. The memorable image is Ray's homage to Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, who was a proficient violinist as well as painter the American photographer in Paris greatly admired.

Ray first made the image by painting the f-holes onto the image. In 1962 he made the record-breaking print in his darkroom, his original image of Kiki’s back fused with the f-holes that he had already light-burned into the photographic paper.

Known at The Jacobs Print, it was created by Ray for an exhibition of his work at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris in 1962. It was then acquired directly from the artist by his friends, the collectors Rosalind and Melvin Jacobs. Rosalind was a fashion buyer who, with her husband, got to know Ray and several of his contemporaries, building a remarkable collection of Surrealist and Dada art.

The sale beat Ray's previous auction record by $6.54m, a 100% rise. His previous record was set by an early painting, Promenade (1916), which sold for $5.88m at Sotheby's on November 6, 2013. The work had not been traded before.

A Brief History of Man Ray at Auction