Salvator Mundi

The painting was done in High Renaissance style and depicts Jesus in an anachronistic blue Renaissance dress, making the sign of the cross with his right hand, while holding a transparent, non-refracting crystal orb in his left, signalling his role as Salvator Mundi and representing the 'celestial sphere' of the heavens. Approximately thirty copies and variations of the work by pupils and followers of Leonardo have been identified. Two preparatory chalk and ink drawings of the drapery by Leonardo are held in the British Royal Collection.

The painting is oil on walnut and measures 45.7 cm × 65.7 cm (25.8 in × 19.2 in).

In 2017, Salvator Mundi was sold by Christie’s in New York for $450.3 million, the most expensive painting ever sold at a public auction at that time. Despite the fact that this painting sold for such a high price, there is quite a bit of controversy around its origin.

Purchased in 2005 by two art dealers in New Orleans, no one recognized the work as a da Vinci. Worms had infected the wood support; at one point, it had been inadequately restored and overpainted. The overpainting was stripped away, missing sections were restored, and the investors believed they had a da Vinci painting in their hands. After years of analysis and research, it was included as a lost original in a Leonardo da Vinci exhibit at London’s National Gallery in 2011—although some specialists still dispute that it is a da Vinci. 

The painting has not been publicly exhibited since the 2017 Christie's auction, and since late 2020 has been in storage in Saudi Arabia reportedly awaiting a museum and cultural center to be completed in Al-'Ula.