‘Harry Potter’ art sells for R35 million at auction

The original watercolour illustration for the first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone – the book that introduced the world to the young bespectacled wizard – sold for $1.9 million (about R35 million) this week.

The artwork becomes “the most valuable Harry Potter item ever sold at auction”, auction house Sotheby’s said.

“The illustration was chased by four bidders on the phone and online for nearly 10 minutes before selling to applause.”

The work by Thomas Taylor, who was just 23 years old in 1997 when he painted the iconic image of the young boy with the lightning bolt scar and the round glasses, had been expected to fetch between $400,000 and $ 600,000 at Sotheby’s.

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Taylor was working at a children’s bookstore in Cambridge, England when he was asked to paint the image for JK Rowling’s book by publisher Barry Cunningham at Bloomsbury. The book was released in London on 26 June 1997.

He was one of the first people to read the book, getting an early copy of the manuscript to inform his artwork, according to Sotheby’s books specialist Kalika Sands.

“So, he knew about the world before anybody else, and it was really up to him to think of how he visualised Harry Potter,” Sands told AFP ahead of the auction.

Rowling and Taylor were unknown when the book was released, and few expected it would become a global phenomenon.

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Only 500 copies of the first edition were printed, and 300 of them were sent to libraries, according to Sotheby’s.

But the book soon became a runaway bestseller. 22 years later, the so-called Potterverse features Rowling’s seven original books, a blockbuster film franchise, a critically acclaimed stage play and video games.

To date, 500 million copies of the books have been sold. The book has been translated into 80 languages.

It’s exciting to see the painting that marks the very start of my career, decades later and as bright as ever,” Taylor, now a children’s book author and illustrator, said Taylor in a statement released by Sotheby’.

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