9. Bal Du Moulin De La Galette (Pierre-Auguste Renoir) - £94.9m ($142.1m)
Bal du moulin de la Galette is an 1876 masterpiece by French Impressionist artist Pierre-Auguste Renoir . Regarded as one of Impressionism's most-celebrated artworks, Renoir's painting depicts a normal Sunday afternoon in the Moulin de la Galette district of Montmatre, Paris. Although originally in the collection of French painter Gustave Caillebotte, it moved into the hands of the French Republic when he died and was hung in the Musée du Luxembourg before being moved to the Musée du Louvre and then Musée d'Orsay. However, the honorary chairman of Daishowa Paper Manufacturing in Japan, Ryoei Saito, purchased the painting for the equivalent of $142.1million (£94.9million) at Sotheby's auction house in New York in 1990.
NUFC editor for WhatCulture.com/NUFC. History graduate (University of Edinburgh) and NCTJ-trained journalist. I love sports, hopelessly following Newcastle United and Newcastle Falcons. My pastimes include watching and attending sports matches religiously, reading spy books and sampling ales.
