A 20 year old nude photo of Madonna will be on auction at Christie’s house in New York, February 12.

The photograph titled ‘Nude’, which earned Madonna a $25 modeling fee, is expected to sell for $10,000, at the very least. It’s a full frontal image, taken by Lee Friedlander in 1979 and published in Playboy in 1985.

Madonna was a dancer - says Matthieu Humery, head of Christie’s photography department - when she answered Friedlander’s newspaper ad seeking a nude model.

The rare, 101.27-carat diamond sold at Christie’s spring 2008 Hong Kong auction is now known as “The Shizuka Diamond,” Christie’s announced on Thursday.

The giant stone’s owner selected the name as a gift for his wife of 16 years.

The Shizuka diamond netted $6.2 million at “Jewels: The Hong Kong Sale” in May 2008 and is the largest colorless diamond ever sold at auction in Asia.

A painting by Claude Monet, which is said to have started the new trend of ‘Impressionism’ with its colour-filled canvas, built with darting brushstrokes, is to go under the hammer next month.

The painting, Dans La Prairie, painted in 1876 and first shown at an exhibition in Paris in 1877, features the artist’s wife Camille almost submerged in a flower-strewn field in Argenteuil, to the north of Paris.

Monet’s skill in capturing the scene even bedazzled his contemporary, Paul Cezanne.

It’s just a whisper at the moment but it may well be the case that Francois Pinault is considering the sale of his Christie’s auction house which he bought in May 1998 for $1.2 billion.

The speculation is based on one obvious fact: at circa €4.7bn, Artemis, Mr Pinault’s holding company, is carrying too much debt.

And while all auctions across Bonhams, Sotheby’s and Christie’s haven’t experienced a great year, Christie’s has already cut a couple of departments, shrunk others, let a few employees go and plan more reorganization for the company in January.

Christie’s on Wednesday sold an extremely rare, 17th century fancy deep grayish-blue diamond for $24.3 million, a world record price for any diamond or jewelry sold at auction in London.

The 35.56-ct. Wittelsbach diamond was once owned by King Philip IV of Spain, who purchased for his daughter, Margarita Teresa, for her engagement to Leopold I of Austria in 1664. It was mined in India and owned by the same private collector since 1964.

The price for Wittelsbach topped the previous record of $16.5 million for a 100ct diamond in 1995 in Geneva.

This extraordinary blue-gray diamond (on the picture above) was given to Infanta Margarita Teresa by her father King Philip IV of Spain, on her engagement to her uncle Leopold I of Austria-one of the most historic events in European history.
This girl was the portrayed in Las Meninas), the most famous painting by Spaniard Diego Velazquez. In a political move, she was engaged to Leopold I, who later became the Holy Roman Emperor, and that was when her father gave his 13-year-old daughter the diamond as part of the dowry. Sadly she died aged only 21, having given birth to four child, of which only one survived beyond childhood.

It is believed that the Wittelsbach diamond originated from the Indian diamond mines, was passed into the Austrian and then Bavarian crown jewels, and was finally sold into private hands in 1931. It makes part of the current private collection since 1964.

According to a Christie’s spokesman said “no examples” of coloured diamonds comparable to the Wittelsbach have been put up in an auction before.
“Blue diamonds are rare and to offer a blue diamond of this size, quality, shape and provenance is truly extraordinary.” Actually, the nearest comparable coloured diamond sold at Christie’s was one just a third of the size, a 13.39 carat intense blue diamond that fetched £5.5 million ($8.9 million) in May.

In addition, “the appearance of a large blue diamond, among the rarest of colours, with a history that can be traced back to the 17th century and 300 years of royal connections will surely be a thrilling occasion for all collectors of exceedingly rare jewels and works of art.”

The Wittelsbach diamond is the star lot in Christie’s auction Jewels: According to estimates, the 35.56-carat gem, almost once inch in width, with a 300-year-old royal history, could raise up to 10million pounds ($16 million) when it goes under the hammer on December 10.

It is on public display at the auction house in King Street, St James’s, London, on Friday 5 December and from Sunday 7 to Tuesday 9 December.