Landseer's 'Scene in Braemar' Fetches £5.9m at Sotheby's

Sir Edwin Landseer's 'Scene in Braemar', a companion to 'Monarch of the Glen', sold for £5,946,000 at Sotheby's in London, five times the previous auction record for the artist. The painting, over nine feet wide, depicts a twelve-point stag on a Highland peak. It was completed around 1857 and first shown at the Royal Academy that year. Commissioned by railway magnate Edward Betts for £800, it was intended for Preston Hall. The work passed through private hands after Betts sold it in 1868 following a banking crisis. The sale exceeded the pre-sale estimate of up to £4 million. The previous record for a Landseer was set in 1994 when the same painting sold for £793,500. Julian Gascoigne, senior director of Sotheby's paintings department, noted the contrast between the youthful 'Monarch' and the darker, more epic 'Braemar'. The painting reflects Landseer's deep familiarity with the Highlands, where he traveled frequently from 1824.