Frauenbildnis (Portrait of Ria Munk III), one of Gustav Klimt's last portraits, is expected to go for $26.1 million at a June 23 Christie’s auction in London. Not bad for an incomplete work: when Klimt died in 1918 the painting was left unfinished in the artist's studio. The portrait's provenance is informed by a compelling back-story: recently surfaced evidence shows that the work was looted by the Nazis from a family in the 1930s. (Last year city council members in Linz, Austria decided to return the work to the family.) The work is in good company at the auction: a Picasso "Blue Period" painting of an absinthe drinker is also up for grabs.
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