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If you win at €150 you will pay ≈ €188 incl. 25% buyer's premium.
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Bears a pencil inscription ‘G. de Chirico’ at the lower right and a further pencil inscription at the lower left. The inscription has not been verified as the artist’s own signature: this is a reproduction after de Chirico, and the inscription is not offered as, and should not be read as, a signature by Giorgio de Chirico. Framer’s stamp ‘Arte Cuadro, Alicante’ on the reverse.
Sizes:
Frame: 27 × 21 cm | 10.6 × 8.3 in
Artwork: 24 × 18 cm | 9.4 × 7.1 in
Three gladiators fight in a bare, box-like room while a fourth lies fallen in the foreground; through an opening at the back, other figures look on. The composition, the deliberately archaic anatomy and the theatrical, airless setting all belong to the gladiator cycle that Giorgio de Chirico painted and drew between 1927 and the mid-1930s for the collector Léonce Rosenberg and for his own increasingly classical programme.
The print is offered after Giorgio de Chirico’s etching ‘Combattimento di Gladiatori,’ one of the plates he made for Jean Cocteau’s Le Mystère Laïc (Paris, 1928), reproducing that composition rather than being from the artist’s own hand. It bears a pencil inscription ‘G. de Chirico’ at the lower right and a further pencil inscription at the lower left, and on the reverse the stamp of a framer in Alicante. The inscription has not been verified as de Chirico’s own signature and is not offered as one: the work is catalogued as after de Chirico, and the inscription is recorded only as a mark found on the sheet.
Framed under glass.
Cf. Giorgio de Chirico, ‘Combattimento di Gladiatori,’ etching, from Jean Cocteau, Le Mystère Laïc, Paris, 1928 (the original composition this print reproduces).
Very good condition: the sheet evenly toned, with a crisp plate mark and clear linework; two small, isolated spots of foxing in the lower part of the image; a pencil inscription ‘G. de Chirico’ (not verified as the artist’s signature) and the number 5/100; no tears, losses or restoration; not examined out of the frame. Please contact us to request a detailed Condition Report.
Packed as size XS (up to 40 × 30 cm) · 27 × 21 cm framed
Insurance is optional. It follows the final hammer price, so with insurance the total moves with the bidding. The work is glazed, which the final quote may price differently. Indicative rates of our shipping partner MBE for packing and door-to-door transport; the final quote is confirmed after the sale. Import duties and taxes outside the EU are paid by the buyer.
We coordinate packing and shipping on your behalf, with insurance available if you’d like it — or you’re welcome to arrange your own. Please see our Shipping Information page for full details before completing your purchase.
The sale of this lot is final.
Offered and sold as attributed; the Five-Year Authenticity Guarantee does not apply to this lot. See our Conditions of Sale.
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Bidding on this site, the buyer’s premium is 25%, Spanish IVA included. There is no VAT on the hammer price and no card fee.
| Starting price | Low estimate | High estimate | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hammer price | €150 | €200 | €300 |
| Buyer’s premium 25% (IVA included) | €38 | €50 | €75 |
| Total on auroraathena.com | €188 | €250 | €375 |
| Total through a bidding platform (30%) | €195 | €260 | €390 |
Through LiveAuctioneers, Invaluable, Drouot or Bidspirit the premium is 30%: the same hammer of €300 costs €390 there against €375 here. Shipping and insurance are quoted separately; the estimator below gives the figure for your country. Buyers outside the EU pay no Spanish tax on the lot; the destination’s import rules apply (United States: original paintings and drawings enter duty-free; United Kingdom: 5% import VAT on art). Card payments are accepted up to €10,000; larger amounts by bank transfer.
The estimate of €200–€300 is our opinion of the range this work should reach; the starting price of €150 is the lowest bid we accept. We have not published comparable results for this lot; ask us before the sale and we will send the results we based the estimate on.
Bidding on this site, the buyer’s premium is 25%, Spanish IVA included, and there is no VAT on the hammer price and no card fee: at the starting price of €150 the total is €188; at the low estimate of €200 the total is €250; at the high estimate of €300 the total is €375.
Through LiveAuctioneers, Invaluable, Drouot or Bidspirit the premium is 30%, so the same hammer of €300 costs €390 there. Shipping and insurance are quoted separately; the estimator on this page gives the figure for your country. Buyers outside the EU pay no Spanish tax on the lot; the destination’s import rules apply (United States: original paintings and drawings enter duty-free; United Kingdom: 5% import VAT on art). Card payments are accepted up to €10,000; larger amounts by bank transfer.
No. This lot is catalogued as “After”, a qualified attribution: it is offered and sold as described, and the Five-Year Authenticity Guarantee of Section 4 of the Conditions of Sale does not apply. The estimate reflects that.
A condition report with ultraviolet photographs is prepared on request, normally within two working days; the condition summary on this page is examined in-house and is not a conservator’s report. Further photographs of any detail, the reverse or the frame are sent on request. The work can be examined in our Barcelona showroom by appointment before the sale, and you are welcome to send your own conservator or specialist.
You can leave a maximum bid before the sale (the sale is on Saturday, October 17th, 2026 (Auction ended)) or bid live in our online room. A maximum bid is executed by the auctioneer only as much as is needed to stay ahead of other bidders, in the sale’s increments, never above your maximum.
Where a reserve exists it never exceeds the low estimate; a lot without a reserve sells to the highest bid at or above the starting price of €150.
Giorgio de Chirico was born in Volos, Greece, in 1888 to Italian parents, and studied in Athens and at the Munich Academy, where Böcklin and Nietzsche shaped his imagination. In Paris from 1911 he painted the empty piazzas, long shadows, mannequins and towers of Pittura Metafisica — pictures that Apollinaire championed and that the Surrealists later claimed as their founding revelation.
After the First World War he turned to the Old Masters, provoking a lasting quarrel with Breton; the 1920s and 1930s brought the horses on the shore, the archaeologists and the gladiators painted for Léonce Rosenberg.
From 1944 de Chirico lived in Rome, in the house on Piazza di Spagna that is now his museum, painting neo-Baroque self-portraits and still lifes, remaking his own metaphysical pictures and, in his last decade, the ‘neo-metaphysical’ works. He also made prints and lithographs throughout his career.
He died in Rome in 1978. His work is in every major museum of modern art, from MoMA to the Centre Pompidou and the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna.
Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978), founder of Metaphysical painting: Volos, Munich and Paris, the classical turn, the gladiator cycle of the late 1920s, and an engraving after him at Aurora & Athena.
Highlights of the Aurora & Athena autumn sale on 17 October 2026: Bridget Tichenor, Nicholas Roerich, Konstantin Korovin, Gerard Sekoto, Jan Zrzavý, Pan Yuliang, a Miró lithograph and the painters of the École de Paris.
“The description and photos of the artwork were accurate, and I felt confident in my purchase from the beginning. The team was quick to answer my questions and kept me well informed throughout the process.”
“I had a really good experience after the sale — it was smooth, asked a question and got an answer right away. Their customer service is excellent and very fast. Definitely recommend them.”
