As the last grandson of the founder of the Rockefeller dynasty, he disposed of his inheritance

David Rockefeller was the last grandson of the founder of Standard Oil Co. John Rockefeller. Born rich, he had a weakness for contemporary art and spent most of his life collecting works of Paul Gauguin, Diego Rivera, Henri Matisse and others. Now, when these works of art have jumped in price, they constitute a significant part of his condition.

Starting in May 8 auction house Christie's will be in a few days to sell the collection of David Rockefeller, writes Bloomberg.

When Rockefeller died in 2017, at the age of 101, he left at least 4 paintings by Claude Monet; the stunning works of Edward Hopper, Georgia O'Keeffe and Georges Seuur; as well as hundreds of other treasures, including a set that Napoleon took with him into exile.

Some of these items were purchased for pennies, compared with their value now. For example, the cost of paintings by Picasso, located in the collection, has increased thousands of times.

In 2007, Rockefeller sold the painting by Mark Rothko on Sotheby's in New York for almost 73 million dollars. He bought it in 1959 for 10 000 dollars.

Rockefeller's wife Peggy died in 1996 year. Together they planned to donate most of their personal fortune to charity. They donated 13 to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which was founded by his mother Abby Oldrich Rockefeller. But ultimately, Rockefeller realized that most organizations needed his money, not pieces of art.

So, with the exception of a few individual items in the will - the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York received a painting by Edouard Manet - Rockefeller decided that after his death his entire collection and other property should be sold. Proceeds from the sale will go to 11 organizations, including The Rockefeller University and Harvard University, as well as a number of charities.

Over the years, the Rockefellers furnished their estate, while giving a lot of money to charity. Christie's collected the most valuable exhibits of the estate in the 1500 lots, which will be put up for sale at several auctions during the week. Cheaper lots will be put up for sale online.

The estimated value of the collection is 500 million dollars, but in the world there has recently been a high interest in rare works of art, so the real sales revenue may exceed a billion dollars.

Christie's expects that Picasso's The Girl with a Basket of Flowers will be sold for 90-120 million dollars. The auction house expects to sell Monet's “Water Lilies” for 50-70 million dollars.

Such prices are quite high, but in addition to the uniqueness of these works of art, one should take into account the value of the Rockefeller name as the previous owner.

Auction organizers expect that Matisse's "Odalisque Reclining Under Magnolias" could sell for $70-90 million. If this forecast comes true, it will be a new record for a Matisse painting; at the moment, the highest price in history for a work by this artist was $46 million. Such a high price for a Matisse painting from the Rockefeller collection is due to the fact that the billionaire admired the artist’s work and his personality and met him personally several times in the 1930s.

Rockefeller also adored the picture of Gauguin "The Wave", which sell Christie's counts for 12 million dollars.

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