Advising the two sides to settle out of court to avoid an “expensive, risky and potentially embarrassing” lawsuit, a New York judge ruled on March 1 that Sotheby’s must deal with billionaire Dimitry Rybolovlev’s claim that he had helped his former dealer scam him. hundreds of millions of dollars for fifteen works of art. Since 2015, Rybolovlev has been suing Yves Bouvier in courts around the world, claiming that the Swiss art dealer overcharged him on thirty-eight works of art that the Russian fertilizer magnate purchased for $2 billion between 2003 and 2015.
Sotheby’s was implicated in knowingly aiding and abetting Bouvier’s fraud in the sale of a dozen of these works, for which Rybolovlev claims he was overcharged a billion dollars. Among the works in question are the most expensive painting in the world: the Salvator Mundi attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, who Rybolovlev bought at the global auction house in 2013 for $127.5 million and sold in 2017 for a record $450.3 million to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Sotheby’s had requested the dismissal for reasons of opportunity. U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman dismissed claims regarding works by Pablo Picasso, Auguste Rodin, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and others, but allowed those related to Leonardo’s work; by Rene Magritte The domain of Arnheim, 1962; by Gustav Klimt Wasserschlangen II, 1907; and Amedeo Modigliani Head1911–12, to continue.
Rybolovlev’s fortune is estimated by Forbes at around $6.6 billion. Courthouse News reports that the oligarch bought the private Greek island of Skorpios in the Ionian Sea and built a high-end arts complex there. The island once belonged to Greek maritime baron Aristotle Onassis and was occupied by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.
