Modigliani's Nu Couché is a trite pastiche – and the buyers saw through the hype

Sotheby’s billed the $157m nude as a proto-feminist portrait of a sexually confident modern woman. In fact, she’s little more than a soft-hued rehash of paintings by more daring innovators

Modigliani is no Leonardo da Vinci. He isn’t even a De Kooning, a Cézanne or a Gauguin. All those artists have had paintings sell at auction for more than $200m. Leonardo’s Salvator Mundi looks set to hold its $450.3m world record for a good while to come, after Modigliani’s Nu Couché (Sur le Côté Gauche) achieved a “mere” $157.2m (£116m) at Sotheby’s in New York last night. Still a nice bit of cash, but far from the astronomical, record-beating sums that were being imagined.

I am not surprised. Even in the unreal world of art sales there has to be some relationship between hype and fact. Modigliani’s painting was being sold as something it is not, which some bidders were bound to notice. It was being praised not for its own merits but for a supposed place in cultural and social history that can’t actually be seen on the canvas.

Related: Modigliani nude fetches $157.2m at Sotheby's – setting auction house record

Related: Modigliani review – 'a gorgeous show about a slightly silly artist'

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