Second Horten Sale Brings Total to $198m
May 14, 23
(IDEX Online) - The second part of the controversial Heidi Horten auction raised over $42m on Friday, bringing the total so far to $198m.
That surpasses the original estimate by Christie's Geneva that the total sale of 700 items, including an online sale that closes tomorrow, would raise $150m.
Christie's said earlier that her gems represented the most valuable jewelry collection ever to be auctioned, surpassing those of Elizabeth Taylor and Qatar royal family member Sheikh Hamad Bin Abdullah Al Thani.
But The World of Heidi Horten: Magnificent Jewels attracted as much attention for Horten's Nazi links as it did for the remarkable jewels on offer.
Her first husband, Helmut Horten, was a Nazi party member who built his fortune buying department stores from Jewish businessmen under duress in 1930s Germany.
Christie's pledged to donate an unspecified percentage of its commission to Holocaust research and education and amended its publicity material following media reports to acknowledge Horten's Nazi links.
The Star of Africa, a Harry Winston pendant necklace featuring a 54.95-carat ruby, surrounded by pear, oval-shaped and round diamonds, led the sale. It went for $3m, almost twice its $1.55m estimate.
The first part of the auction, last Wednesday, raised $156m, despite two star items falling short. The 25.59-carat Sunrise Ruby, which the Austrian billionaire bought for $30m in 2015, sold for $14.6m (low estimate was $15.7m). And the 90-carat "Briolette of India" diamond sold for $7m (low estimate was $10m.
Heidi Horten (nee Jelinek), an Austrian billionaire, was 19 when she first met Horten. He was more than 30 years her senior. He died in 1987, and in 2020 Forbes estimated that her personal fortune at $3bn. She died last June, aged 81.
Pic shows the late Heidi Horten (courtesy Heidi Horten Foundation) and the $3m Star of Africa ruby and diamond necklace (courtesy Christie's).