The Blossom Trees That Set Vincent van Gogh's Auction Record

Vincent van Gogh's Verger avec cyprès (1888) sold for $117.2m at Christie's in New York on November 9, 2022. The oil on canvas work had been traded ten times in the past.

Van Gogh painted the small orchard near Arles in the spring, a few weeks after first arriving in the South of France from Paris. He had arrived during one of the coldest winters on record but he found the inspiration he had sought, in what he hoped would be a Promised Land, when the fruit trees began flowering.

In a burst of creativity, Van Gogh painted 14 Provencal landscapes in a few weeks, sending the canvases back to Paris to his brother, Theo. His widow inherited Verger avec cyprès after her husband and brother-in-law's untimely deaths. Johanna van Gogh would include it in the first major Van Gogh show, which was held at the Stedelijk Museum in 1905.

Later owners of the painting included the American heiress, Joan Whitney Payson, who besides collecting Impressionist paintings was a majority owner of the New York Mets. Her heirs sold the work privately to the Microsoft co-founder, Paul Allen. The record breaking painting is now possibly in Asia, although its current owner remains anonymous.

The sale beat Van Gogh's previous auction record by $35.87m, a 44% rise. The previous record was set by Laboureur Dans Un Champ (1889), which sold for $81.31m at Christie's on November 13, 2017. The work had not been traded before.

A Brief History of Van Gogh at Auction