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“Masquerade” — Gaetano Chierici

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“Autumn Marshland in a Birch Grove”

Austrian artist Adolf Kaufmann (1848–1916)
Oil on canvas; 50 × 80 cm
Private collection

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“It’s time. Go.” — Henrique Alvim Corrêa

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“Sunset of Life”

English artist Walter Langley (1852–1922)
Watercolor on paper
Private collection

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“Portrait of Elizabeth Sophia Maria (Betsy) Cavalini,” 1901

Dutch artist Piet Mondrian (1872–1944)
Oil on canvas; 73 × 53 cm
Private collection

Betsy Cavalini married Cornelis (Kees) Bergman in Amsterdam on March 19, 1902. Bergman was five years older than Mondrian, worked as a stockbroker, and shared his interest in painting, taking lessons from Piet.

Cornelis is known to have owned several of Mondrian’s paintings depicting members of his family.

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“Caught Off Guard” — Vasily Vereshchagin

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“Sizha” — Yuri Klapoukh

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“The Beheading of Saint John the Baptist” — Caravaggio

This is the only painting Caravaggio signed, and he did so in blood: “brother Michelangelo” appears in the blood from the saint’s severed throat. Then a fugitive murderer, Caravaggio had killed a man in a Rome street fight, been sentenced to death and fled to Malta.

There, the Knights of St John welcomed him and made him a knight, offering hope of a papal pardon. He painted this monumental altarpiece for Valletta’s cathedral, the largest canvas of his career. But after a brawl with a higher-ranking knight, he was imprisoned and escaped. In December 1608, the order expelled him as a “rotten and foul” former brother. The ceremony stripping him of his knighthood took place before this very painting.

Caravaggio never received a pardon. Two years later, he died mysteriously, never returning to Rome.

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“Carelessness,” 1917

American artist William McGregor Paxton (1869–1941)
Oil on canvas; 69.2 × 55.9 cm
Private collection

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“Souls on the Banks of the Acheron” — Adolf Hirémy-Hirschl

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“Autumn Flowers,” 1910

Swedish artist Gunnar Gunnarsson Wennerberg (1863–1914)
Oil on canvas; 130 × 70 cm
Nationalmuseum, Sweden

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“Young Italian Woman at a Fruit Stall,” 1874

Austrian artist Ludwig Passini (1832–1903)
Oil on canvas; 47 × 31 cm
Private collection

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“Red Vineyards at Arles” — Vincent van Gogh

Price: $3,750,000

Van Gogh is often said to have sold only one painting in his lifetime: this one. The story is simplified, but essentially true.

It sold for 400 francs at a Brussels exhibition in March 1890, four months before his death. The buyer was Belgian artist and collector Anna Boch, sister of Van Gogh’s friend Eugène Boch, whose portrait he painted in Arles in 1888.

In a letter to his brother Theo, Van Gogh sheepishly noted that the Bochs paid full price, though he should have given them a friends’ discount.

Anna kept the painting until 1907, when Moscow collector and textile manufacturer Ivan Morozov bought it for 30,000 francs, reflecting Van Gogh’s growing posthumous reputation. The Morozov collection was nationalized in 1918; in 1948, the painting went to Moscow’s Pushkin Museum, where it remains.

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“Monks Burying a Chest of Gold by Moonlight,” 1889

German artist August von Wille (1829–1887)
Oil on canvas; 100 × 82 cm
Private collection

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“The Europe Bridge” — Gustave Caillebotte
Price: $160,000

Caillebotte sketched this scene on the bridge, then arranged the figures in his studio. A photograph shows a hat-wearing man standing almost exactly as he does in the painting.

The bridge crosses the tracks at Saint-Lazare station, where six avenues named for European capitals converged. To 19th-century Parisians, it symbolized engineering and the industrial age.

The foreground figures’ identities remain debated. The man in the top hat may be Caillebotte, with acquaintance Anne-Marie Hagen beside him. A worker leans over the railing, contrasting the wealthy flâneur with a laborer who seems to inhabit another world.

First shown at the 1877 Impressionist exhibition, when Caillebotte was 28, the painting reflects his dual role as artist and leading patron. Many Impressionists relied on his support; after his death, his collection helped form France’s national Impressionist collection.

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“Hunters in the Snow” — Pieter Bruegel the Elder

This nearly 500-year-old landscape remains part of modern visual culture: a reproduction appears in the crew’s quarters in Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris, and details feature in his Mirror and Lars von Trier’s Melancholia.

Painted in 1565 for Antwerp collector Nicolaes Jonghelinck, it belonged to a six-work series, The Seasons, likely displayed as a year-round panorama in his dining room. Five works survive. Representing December and January, Hunters in the Snow is among Europe’s first fully realized winter landscapes, making nature the main subject rather than a backdrop.

Near the bottom, figures on the ice play a game resembling modern curling. The painting is one of art’s earliest known depictions of the sport, still popular in Austria and Germany.

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“Girl in a Lilac Dress” — Eugène de Blaas

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“Pierrette Playing the Lute” — Paul de La Boulaye

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“The House Spirit: The Evening Before the Owners Leave” — Pavel Nazim

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“Ilya Repin, Leo Tolstoy relaxing in the forest”

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“The Old Man and His Grandson” — Domenico Ghirlandaio

Price: $395,000

The man’s disfigured nose, thought to show rhinophyma, is painted without idealization. At a time when portraits often flattered their subjects, Ghirlandaio’s honesty helped make this one of the Renaissance’s most human portraits.

The boy looks up at his grandfather with trust and tenderness, without fear or pity. Their quiet affection has moved viewers for centuries. To the child, his grandfather is the most beautiful person in the world.

Through the window, a path, mountains and trees are painted with Flemish precision—an unusual detail in a Florentine portrait, and perhaps a nod to the Netherlandish school’s influence on Italian art.

A persistent legend says the old man was painted from a death mask, explaining his unidealized face. There’s no firm evidence, but the story still arises at the Louvre, where the painting has been held since 1886.

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“Innocence,” 1899

Artist: Arthur Hacker
Oil on canvas
Private collection

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“Portrait of Nadezhda Mikhailovna Sapozhnikova” — Nikolai Feshin

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“A Courtesan for Sale” — Otto Greiner

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The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things — Hieronymus Bosch

Likely designed as a tabletop, the painting invites viewers to walk around it or look down at its scenes. King Philip II of Spain, a Bosch admirer, hung it in his private bedroom at El Escorial so contemplating the sinners might lead him to reflect on his failings before confession.

The composition resembles God’s eye: Christ rises from the tomb at its center, surrounded by the warning “Cave, cave, Dominus videt” (“Beware, beware, the Lord sees”). Seven sections depict wrath, envy, greed, gluttony, sloth, lust, and pride. The corners show death, the Last Judgment, hell, and heaven.

Its authenticity has been debated for over a century. A 2015 study suggested it may be by a pupil, but the Prado still attributes it to Bosch, citing its authentic signature.

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“Feeding the Ducks”

Artist: Carl von Bergen (1853–1933)
Oil on canvas; 79.5 × 58.5 cm
Private collection

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“An Evening in Antiquity,” 1908

Artist: Alphonse Osbert
Oil on canvas; 174 × 158 cm
Petit Palais, France

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“Princess from a Fairy Tale” — Torsten Wasastjerna

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“Dandelion”

Artist: Charles Edward Wilson (1853–1941)
Pencil, watercolor, and white on paper; 23 × 32.5 cm
Private collection

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“Family Member,” 1880

Artist: Frederic George Cotman
Oil on canvas, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool

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