Max Ernst
1891-1976 · German-born French · Dada, Surrealism
Auction record: $24.44M
Le Roi jouant avec la reine, 1944 · Christie's, New York · Nov 9, 2022
Source: masterworks.com
Biography
Max Ernst was a German-born painter and sculptor who moved from Cologne Dada to the centre of Paris Surrealism. He invented or popularised techniques such as frottage, grattage and decalcomania, and built collage novels and dense, hallucinatory forests and cities. Exiled to the United States during the Second World War, he influenced the young New York School before settling in France, where he took citizenship in 1958. His market is deep in prints and works on paper, while major paintings and the bronzes of the 1940s are scarce. The record is the bronze Le Roi jouant avec la reine (1944), sold for 24.4 million dollars at Christie's New York in 2022, while recent sales have mostly been below one million.
Recent auction results
| Le blanc du cielSotheby's, Paris | $147K | Oct 24, 2025 | heni.com |
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Market
- Liquidity: Medium
Museums
- Museum of Modern Art, New York
- Centre Pompidou, Parigi
- Max Ernst Museum, Brühl
- Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venezia
- Tate Modern, Londra
Sources
- Masterworks, Max Ernst auction record
- HENI News, Le blanc du ciel October 2025
- Artfix Daily, Record price for Max Ernst 2011
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