'The superstar of surrealism': Magritte up for auction after 90 years in family collection

A painting by the surrealist artist René Magritte that has been held in a private collection for more than 90 years will go on sale later this month.

- Kim Willsher

La Magie Noire was bought by the family of the second world war resistance heroine Suzanne Spaak, who were Magritte's benefactors at a time when he was struggling financially and had failed to sell a single work for two years. Spaak was shot by the Gestapo in Paris for helping Jewish children to safety.

Sotheby's has estimated La Magie Noire will sell for between €5m (£4.4m) and €7m but expects it to fetch considerably more.

Thomas Bompard, the vice-president of Sotheby's France, said: “It is the first time I have handled a major Magritte work that has been in the same family since it was painted.

“It is extraordinary, as is the history of the family. This painting is the Taylor Swift of surrealism. If you were to ask a group of schoolchildren to do a presentation on the surrealist movement this painting alone would be enough to define it. I call it the superstar of surrealism.”