While we wait for the buyer of S. I. Newhouse’s $181.2 million Jackson Pollock painting to reveal him- or herself, at least one buyer at the May marquee evening sales has stepped forward: Jay Chou.
The Taiwanese pop star posted on Instagram last week that he was winning bidder for the 1924 Henri Matisse painting, La Séance du Matin, offered at Sotheby’s modern art evening sale last Tuesday. The Matisse sold for exactly $20 million before fees, ultimately reaching $21.2 million with fees. It carried a $20 million to $30 million estimate.
That sale didn’t generate the biggest fireworks. In fact, it was another Matisse in that same auction—La Chaise lorraine (ca. 1919), buyer still unknown—that sold for $48.4 million on a $25 million estimate. The bidding battle for that work stretched to over ten minutes.
Chou, however, won his Matisse by guaranteeing the work, according to the New York Times, which got him a $800,000 rebate on the purchase price.
Chou often writes about art, or posts photos of art, on his Instagram. In the post last week, he wrote, “Back when I was in Nice, I used to spend a lot of time standing downstairs outside Henri Matisse’s home, looking up at the balcony by the window. I’d imagine him standing there too someday, staring out at the sunlight over Nice, lost in thought, before walking back into his studio to continue creating. I also used to dream about one day being able to collect one of his works from that period in Nice.
Never thought that today, the dream would actually come true.” The text was accompanied by a short video of the work.
According to the Singaporean English language daily the Straits Times, Chou is known to be a collector, owning works by major figures like Pablo Picasso and Jean-Michel Basquiat. He has said in interviews that he spends a large percentage of his touring earnings on purchasing artworks.
Chou has been a major singer in the Chinese music scene since the early 2000s, with numerous best-selling albums in Taiwan and China. In March, he released his 16th album, Children of the Sun.
