Andreas Gursky's Rhein II sets photo record
An image of the Rhine, by German artist Andreas Gursky, has fetched a stunning £2.7m at Christies auction in New York. This is a new world record for the price paid for a photograph at auction.
Rhein II is one of an edition of six works. The panoramic print is mounted on glass and was created in 1999. Others in the series hang in the Tate Modern and New York’s Museum of Modern Art.
Gursky has spoken of "a particular place with a view over the Rhine which has somehow always fascinated me, but it didn't suffice for a picture as it basically constituted only part of a picture".
He said he "carried this idea for a picture around with me for a year-and-a-half".
"In the end I decided to digitalise the pictures and leave out the elements that bothered me," he added.
Christie's said the viewer was "not invited to consider a specific place along the river, but rather an almost 'platonic' ideal of the body of water as it navigates the landscape"
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