Yusaku Mesawa, a Japanese billionaire art collector who recently traveled to space, sold a huge painting of American Jean-Michel Basquiat for $ 85 million in New York yesterday (Wednesday).
During an auction in Manhattan, Philips’ house sold an “untitled” painting by an artist from the neo-expression movement in 1982, and Pasquit died at the age of 27.
Masawa announced in early March that he wanted to auction off this huge painting he bought for $ 57.3 million. It then made a profit of $ 27.7 million.
In May 2017, the Japanese billionaire bought another Pasquite painting for $ 110.5 million at Sotheby’s auction. At the time, the work was one of ten works sold at auction for more than $ 100 million.
Maezawa, 46, is the founder of the largest online clothing and accessories store in Zozotown, Japan.
The millionaire said last March that it was a “great honor” for him to have six years to own this painting, but that art “should be shared to become a part of everyone’s life.”
In December, Masawa became the first Japanese astronaut to visit the International Space Station as part of a voyage organized by the Russian space agency.
Maezawa also owns the works of Pablo Picasso, Roy Liechtenstein, Andy Warhol and Jeff Goons, and claims to be a “casual collector” of contemporary art who buys paintings based on his intuition. In 2017, he told AFP he was buying products he saw beautiful, and that was it.