An IPO for a Painting? This $55 Million Masterpiece Is Going Public
A portrait by British painter Francis Bacon will be publicly listed this summer, even as rising interest rates blur the case for investing in art
By Carol Ryan
What would the late painter Francis Bacon make of it all? A portrait of his lover is about to make its stock-market debut, giving the average Joe access to the rarefied world of serious art collecting.
One catch is that the megarich may have enjoyed the best spoils already.
A company named Artex is launching a roughly $55 million initial public offering of Bacon’s “Three Studies for a Portrait of George Dyer,” painted shortly after the couple met in 1963. Shares in the portrait will be sold for around $100 a piece and will list on a specially created art stock exchange based in Liechtenstein, giving regular investors the ability to buy and sell shares in a famous artwork on a stock exchange for the first time.