It may be a sign of the end of the great actor approaching. Alain Delon’s art collection was auctioned off in Paris yesterday, raising more than seven million euros, money destined for charity.
Among the 84 works auctioned are paintings by Delacroix and Corot, the great landscaper of the 19th century, etchings by Dürer – The Knight, Death and the Devil, from 1513 – and Rembrandt, drawings by Degas and Italian masters from the 16th century, and animal sculptures by Rembrandt Bugatti and Giot. However, the big star was a painting by Raoul Dufy, Santi Adris Bay, the only batch to pass the one million euro mark.
Dillon made his first purchase in 1969, and only three years later he lost his mind over a drawing of an insect by Dürer’s hand. His collection would grow exponentially with purchases in London and Paris, especially in the 1970s. With a very pronounced flair for painting and especially for Millet, author of Angelus (1857).
“The difference between me and the professionals is that they have a limit, I don’t,” the actor stated in an interview with Le Monde in 2007. “They may have more money, but when a certain estimate passes, they stop. I was so out of it at the time that that I have kept the last Dürer drawing for public sale.”
The 87-year-old French actor revealed last March that he was going to say goodbye to a life of assisted suicide.
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