Rembrandt Bugatti’s Trois Pantheres Marchant (Three Panthers Walking), €3m (£2.53m) at Bonhams Cornette de Saint Cyr.
Trois Pantheres Marchant (Three Panthers Walking), a work made when Bugatti was just 21, came to auction for the first time.
It was knocked down just below the estimate of €3.5m-5m for a price that was €3.68m including premium as part of a 46 offering of Impressionist and Modern paintings and sculpture on June 5.
An imposing 4ft 11in (1.5m) wide, Trois Pantheres Marchant featured on the cover of the catalogue raisonné of the artist's work, written by Véronique Fromanger. Exceptional for its size, patina and a unique lost wax cast, it is signed and dated 1905 and dedicated in Italian to Bugatti’s founder and patron Adrien-Aurélien Hébrard.
A detail from Rembrandt Bugatti’s Trois Pantheres Marchant (Three Panthers Walking), €3m (£2.53m) at Bonhams Cornette de Saint Cyr.
The inscription in the cast reads A Monsieur AA Hébrard qui a créé l'artiste et l'homme (To Mr AA Hébrard who created the artist and the man). Hébrard arranged for the work to be shown at the Salon d'Automne in Paris in 1905 but chose to keep the piece all his life.
It was later sold by his heirs to the collector who offered it for sale in Paris.
Bugatti found his exotic subject matter in the menagerie at the Jardin des Plantes in Paris where he moved in 1903. He took the time to observe the panthers there every day and described them as "his companions in life and work".
Rembrandt Bugatti inscribed the bronze to his founder and patron Adrien-Aurélien Hébrard. It hammered for €3m (£2.53m) at Bonhams Cornette de Saint Cyr.
The previous auction high for Bugatti, according to Artprice, was Éléphant d'Asie (mendiant) from an edition of five sold for £1.5m at Sotheby’s in June 2022.
