Van Gogh and Cézanne lead November’s auction highlights

On 18 November, Sotheby’s will offer Vincent van Gogh’s Châtaigniers en fleurs in London, with an estimate in the region of $180 million, as part of the Legendary: The Blaquier-Arrieta Collection Evening Auction. Painted in Auvers-sur-Oise during the final weeks of the artist’s life, it shows blossoming chestnut trees against a blue sky, with women passing by in parasols and Japanese-inspired dress.

What makes the work compelling for artists is not only its rarity, but the way it reveals Van Gogh’s eye at this moment: a landscape still charged with energy, yet tightly shaped by colour and movement. Its absence from public view since entering the Blaquier-Arrieta collection in 1975 adds another layer, because a painting that has been out of sight for so long is often read differently when it returns.

A rare Cezanne, then Man Ray in Paris

That same evening, Sotheby’s will also sell Paul Cezanne’s Arlequin, estimated at around $120 million. Painted between 1888 and 1890, it is one of only four known examples from the harlequin series, inspired by Mardi Gras parades from the artist’s childhood in Aix-en-Provence, and it has not been seen publicly since 1975.

For painters and draftsmen, the interest lies in how the figure is built, as much as in the work’s history of ownership: model, costume, memory and collection all overlap here. In Paris on 13 November, Christie’s will also offer Man Ray’s Le Baiser, from the Roger Therond collection, with an estimate of €250,000 to €350,000; the photograph plays with ambiguous poses and with what the frame deliberately leaves unresolved.