Restituted Pissarro masterpiece to go on sale at Sotheby’s

An exceptional, museum-quality painting by Camille Pissarro, Boulevard Montmartre, matinée de printemps of 1897 is to go on sale at Sotheby’s London in February.

One of the most important Impressionist masterworks to come to auction in the last decade, the painting was originally owned by Max Silberberg, a Jewish industrialist based in Breslau, who assembled one of the finest pre-war collections of 19th and 20th Century art in Germany.

Forced by the Nazis to sell his entire collection, he later died in the Holocaust. The painting was restituted in 2000 to Max Silberberg’s family and will now be offered at auction in Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Art Evening Sale on 5th February 2014 with an estimate of £7-10 million.

Helena Newman, Chairman of Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Art Department Europe, said: “It is an honour to be entrusted with offering the greatest work by Camille Pissarro ever to appear at auction – a work that encompasses such a richly painted canvas and a supremely elegant composition.

“The appeal of these extremely desirable attributes to discerning collectors is enhanced by the painting’s history of having been housed in a collection as important as Max Silberberg’s. With the enduring demand for Impressionist masterpieces – particularly works of such rarity as this work by Pissarro – we anticipate interest from around the globe.”