At the Artcurial auction house in Paris, Auguste Rodin’s white marble sculpture of the mythical Ethiopian princess “Andromede” sold for $4.1 million. The selling price topped the estimated price of well above the top estimated price of approximately $1.4 million. The masterpiece was created in 1886-1887 and depicts the daughter of Ethiopian King Cepheus nude and asleep on a rock. In 1888, Rodin presented the work to Carlos Morla Vicuna, a Chilean diplomat living in Paris at the time, as a gift. The sculpture is one of five carvings Rodin created of the subject, especially renowned for the contrast between Andromede’s smooth finish and the virtually untouched roughness of the jutting slab of rock.
