Christie’s will sell a painting from Claude Monet’s Matinées sur la Seine series at its evening sale of 20th- and 21st-century art on March 7 in London for an estimated price of up to £18 million (US$22.7 million).
Matinée sur la Seine, temps net (Mornings on the Seine, clear weather) , 1897, was consigned by an unnamed collector who bought it in May 1978 at a Sotheby’s auction in New York for US$330,000, according to Christie’s. The painting is among early examples of Monet’s practice of serialising specific scenes, “a technique that would ultimately transform his art,” Christie’s said in a news release.
In this example, Monet painted the river Seine during summer mornings in 1896 and 1897. “Tracing the sun as it passes over the scene, from the first rays of light at dawn, to the full brilliance of the sun at mid-morning, this extraordinary sequence of works was conceived as a connected, interrelated sequence of canvases,” Christie’s said.
A viewer can see the sun rising across the canvases when they are exhibited as a group, the auction house said. It was after Monet painted the Creuse valley in central France at different times of day in 1889 that he returned to the idea of serialization. A painting from the Creuse series, Prairie fleurie à Giverny , 1890, also will be offered during the March 7 evening sale. Christie’s has not placed a value on the work yet, which is being consigned from a Japanese collection.
Another example from the Seine series, also painted in 1897, sold at Christie’s in November 2017 from the collection of Nancy Lee and Perry R. Bass. Titled simply Matinée sur la Seine , the painting sold for nearly US$23.4 million. Matinée sur la Seine, temps net has not been seen publicly since 1990, when it toured in an exhibition titled “Monet in the ‘90s: The Series Paintings,” which opened at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston before traveling to the Art Institute in Chicago, and the Royal Academy of Arts in London.
The painting will be on view in New York from Friday through Wednesday, before being shown in Hong Kong from Feb. 21-23 and then in London, March 1-7.
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With US$40 million already committed, the Global Talent Fund is attracting investor attention with a strategy focused on building globally scalable consumer brands alongside high-profile talent.
A new investment fund targeting celebrity-founded consumer brands has secured US$40 million in commitments and is rapidly approaching its US$50 million fundraising target, signalling growing investor appetite for alternative opportunities beyond traditional asset classes.
The Global Talent Fund, which has a maximum raise of US$100 million, focuses on building and investing in consumer businesses alongside celebrities, athletes, and influential personalities who play an active role as co-founders rather than simply endorsing products.
The strategy is based on the belief that changes in consumer behaviour, particularly the rise of social media and digital engagement, have fundamentally altered how brands are built and scaled.
GTF founding partner Jeremy Hunt, who is helping lead the fund’s strategy, said consumers increasingly feel connected to personalities they follow online and are more willing to support products developed by those individuals.
“Consumers are searching for content to engage with, and when a celebrity they like or follow takes them on the journey of creating a product or brand, they genuinely feel part of that process,” he said.
The fund is targeting high-growth consumer sectors including wellness, hydration, beauty and recovery, areas Hunt believes continue to benefit from strong global demand and ongoing innovation.
Rather than backing celebrity endorsement deals, the fund is seeking businesses where talent is deeply involved in product development, brand creation and long-term growth.
According to Hunt, authenticity remains one of the biggest differentiators between successful celebrity-backed brands and those that fail.
“The consumer can see clearly if someone is simply being paid to promote a product,” he said. “The winners are typically the brands where the celebrity has genuinely helped build the business from the ground up.”
The model has attracted support from several prominent Australian investors and business families, reflecting broader interest in alternative investments with global growth potential.
Hunt said consumer brands offered a level of tangibility that many investors found appealing.
“Consumer brands are what we touch, feel, smell and taste every day,” he said. “Our investors understand the growth potential in the model, but they also want to be part of the journey.”
The fund’s rapid progress towards its fundraising target comes amid growing recognition that celebrity influence, when combined with strong commercial execution and scalable business models, can create significant enterprise value.
With several high-profile celebrity-founded businesses generating billion-dollar exits in recent years, supporters of the strategy believe the opportunity remains in its early stages.
For more information, contact marc@kanebridge.com.au
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