Reality sometimes surpasses fiction. The true story of Savior of the Worldthe most expensive painting in the world, thus adds all the flavor to this comic book, which looks like a thriller, which is released in bookstores this January 8. Since its sale in 2017 at Christie’s in New York for $450 million (€437 million) to Saudi Prince Mohammed Ben Salman (MBS), this painting has still not reappeared in a public exhibition. And art historians continue to debate its attribution, some seeing it as an authentic Leonardo da Vinci – unfortunately very degraded –, others a work by one of his students.
Rediscovery of the work in 2005
Written by Antoine Vitkine, who has already made a documentary on the crazy tribulations of the painting, with the assistance of journalist Sébastien Borgeaud, the scenario is based – without citing it – on the meticulous investigation of the English art historian Ben Lewis, The Last Leonardo. The secret lives of the world’s most expensive paintingpublished in 2019. It traces the rediscovery of the work, masked by a very dirty varnish, in 2005 in an ordinary auction, by a New York art dealer who bought it for 1,075 dollars (1,043 €). Then its careful restoration until its presentation at the National Gallery in London in an exhibition dedicated to Leonardo da Vinci.
Thus dubbed, we see the work then resold in 2015 to the Russian billionaire Dmitri Rybolovlev for 127.5 million dollars (124 million euros), via his art advisor Yves Bouvier, who secretly pocketed 40 million dollars in commission ( 39 million euros). This sleight of hand later triggers the fury of the oligarch, who decides to take this broker to court (the case was dismissed) and then decides to resell the work at Christie’s…
Marketing genius
Treated in a range of grays, barely enhanced with a touch of mauve or sepia, the illustrations take this series into troubled waters, where we come across large sharks with long teeth. They are signed Éric Liberge, to whom we owe the remarkable series Mr. Mardi Gras Come down, Goscinny Prize in 1999, or more recently three albums on The Shroud of Turin, written by Jérôme Prieur and Gérard Mordillat.
His realistic style excels in showcasing the marketing genius of the young Christie’s salesman who was able to orchestrate this sale of the century by attracting some of the biggest fortunes on the planet. Throughout the scenes, eloquent parallels are also woven between the yachts and the ultra-luxurious buildings of Rybolovlev and the Saudi MBS, emblems of the same oversized ego, transcending their differences of culture and religion.
Invited to dinner at the Louvre in 2018 by Emmanuel Macron, the Saudi prince allegedly tried to impose the inclusion of his Savior of the World in the Leonardo da Vinci retrospective planned by this museum a year later. Without success. And we have fun following in the comic strip the imaginary dialogue reconstituted between the two heads of state. When diplomacy and colossal commercial issues come to pollute the theoretically hushed debates of art history…
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