Park West Gallery Founder Albert Scaglione Interviewed on Record-Breaking Monet Auction
Claude Monet’s “Meules” sold for $110.7 million at auction on May 14, 2019.
“Wild stuff.” That’s how Park West Gallery Founder and CEO Albert Scaglione characterized this week’s record-breaking auction for a painting by Claude Monet.
Scaglione was a guest on the “Michigan’s Big Show” radio program on May 15 to talk about the unprecedented sale with host Michael Patrick Shiels. (Interview starts at the 1:53 mark.)
Listen to “Albert Scaglione, Founder and CEO of the Park West Gallery” on Spreaker.
The 1891 painting, titled “Meules,” sold for $110.7 million at Sotheby’s in New York after what Scaglione called eight minutes of “fevered bidding.”
“It was pretty much a fight,” Scaglione said.
Albert Scaglione
The painting is considered to be one of the most revered works from Monet’s famous “Haystacks” series. The painting had previously sold in auction for $2.5 million in 1986. Scaglione credited the relative scarcity of Monet works for causing the huge increase in sale price from one auction to another.
The winning bidder has not yet been revealed to the public. Scaglione noted that the winner could be a private collector, but felt that it was more likely that the purchaser could be a museum, potentially in the Middle East.
He cited how a previous record-breaking art sale—for Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi,” which sold for $450 million in 2017—ended up being acquired by the Louvre Abu Dhabi.
“Meules” by Claude Monet
Scaglione called the potential acquisition “extremely positive,” stating that, “I think it’s wonderful to see Western culture going to the East.”
The interview with Scaglione then transitioned into talk about Park West Gallery, which is celebrating its 50-year anniversary in 2019.
He called out the “amazing” Park West Museum, a free-to-the-public museum just outside of Detroit. The museum collects significant works from Park West Gallery’s archives, including artwork from master artists like Rembrandt van Rijn, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Salvador Dalí, Joan Miró, and more.
It also has, what Scaglione called, the largest collection of original ceramics by Pablo Picasso currently on display anywhere in the world.
While talking about Park West, Scaglione was enthusiastic about the future of the company. “I’m going to be 80 this year, the company is going to be 50,” he said. “And I’m just starting. I’m not saying the next 50 is ahead of me, but you never know!”
One of the Picasso galleries at Park West Museum.
