Sotheby's reported Thursday afternoon that the "Portrait of a Young Man Holding a Medallion", a painting by Sandro Botticelli painted in 1480, had sold for $ 92.2 million.

This marks a first in nearly two years for a work of art and a record for a portrait.

The

Portrait of a Young Man Holding a Medallion

, a painting by Italian Renaissance master Sandro Botticelli, was sold on Thursday for $ 92.2 million (76 million euros) at a sale organized by Sotheby's.

This is a high for almost two years for a work of art at auction.

After a short back and forth between two collectors, a buyer giving his orders in London won with a final offer at $ 80 million, a price to which are added fees and commissions.

Exceptional state of conservation

"When you look at a painting like this, which is so exceptional, you have to compare it to other masterpieces, paintings by Picasso, Bacon or Basquiat", which have broken records in recent years years, argues Christopher Apostle, head of the Old Masters department at Sotheby's in New York.

Among the old masters, only Leonardo da Vinci, with the 450 million dollars of his "Salvator Mundi", crossed the 100 million at auction. 

Although more than 500 years old, Botticelli's painting is in an exceptional state of preservation.

Undated, it is believed to have been made between the late 1470s and early 1480s by Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510), born Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi.

"Impressive" work

This was the painter's most prolific period, during which he traveled to Rome at the Pope's request to decorate the Sistine Chapel, and also painted

The Birth of Venus

and

Spring

, two of his most famous works.

"This image symbolizes the Renaissance in Florence", says Christopher Apostle, that moment "when everything fundamentally changed for Western thought, art and literature".

"This Botticelli is so much more impressive than anything we have seen happen on the market" from this painter, argues Christopher Apostle.

In the possession of a collector, who had bought it 810,000 books in 1982 (about $ 1.3 million), it was nevertheless exhibited in many museums and for long periods.