A Muhammad Ali portrait by Andy Warhol is up for sale this week in Miami Beach in the latest test of the fine art market.
Priced at $18 million, the 1977 work was part of Warhol’s athlete-themed follow-up series to his portraits of Marilyn Monroe, Liz Taylor, and Marlon Brando; he also captured silkscreen renditions of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Chris Evert, and O.J. Simpson, though “Andy didn’t really know the difference between a football and a golf ball,” a friend said.
The sellers are hoping to capitalize on momentum generated by a recent $2.2 billion auction week in New York: “There’s flight to quality,” the Warhol dealer told Artnet News. “It has to be the best of the best.”