Celebrated for its bright blue eyeshadow, yellow hair and red lips, Andy Warhol’s Shot Sage Blue Marilyn (1964) is poised to become the most expensive 20th-century artwork ever to sell at auction. Coming to Christie’s in May with an estimate of around $200 million, the 40-square-inch silkscreen of Marilyn Monroe is based on a promotional photo from the actress’s 1953 film Niagara, and forms part of Warhol’s ‘Shot Marilyn’ series, so named after a fabled ‘art happening’ at Warhol’s Factory. In 1964 the performance artist Dorothy Podber walked into Warhol’s studio and with a pistol shot a hole through four of the five Marilyn canvases. The present work remained unharmed.

Offered from the Thomas and Doris Ammann Foundation, it has been described as ‘the most significant 20th-century painting to come to auction in a generation.’ For Georg Frei, Chairman of the Board, Thomas and Doris Ammann Foundation, ‘the spectacular portrait isolates the person and the star: Marilyn the woman is gone; the terrible circumstances of her life and death are forgotten. All that remains is the enigmatic smile that links her to another mysterious smile of a distinguished lady, the Mona Lisa.’ This is blue-chip art at its finest. Paddles at the ready.

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