Why are paintings covered with just one or two colors sold for millions of dollars at global auctions? How can a work that appears simple, and perhaps “unintelligible” to the untrained eye, achieve record numbers and become an iconic artwork?

This question arises strongly when looking at works like those of Russian artist Mark Rothko, whose red painting sold for $81.9 million, while French artist Yves Klein’s blue painting is listed for sale at Christie’s auction for $29 million.

In these works, beauty does not lie in details or complex compositions, but in the idea and the artist’s ability to transform color into a philosophical, contemplative, and perhaps spiritual experience.

Are we facing art that appeals more to the mind than the eye? Or has the art market started valuing concept over form? Here are the most notable paintings that achieved record prices at global auctions.

Christie’s auction house is presenting an Yves Klein painting measuring 14 feet wide, the largest size the artist painted using his signature pigment, International Klein Blue (IKB) – estimated between 16 and 25 million euros ($18-29 million) at a Paris auction next month, according to artnews.

California (IKB 71) is one of Klein’s few titled paintings, named after the state where it was exhibited shortly after its completion in 1961. Yves Klein, who lived in Paris, visited the United States only once, to visit his longtime supporter Virginia Dwan, owner of a legendary art gallery in Los Angeles. Klein died the following year, 1962, at the young age of 34 after a prolific artistic career.

Klein’s painting will be featured in the “Avant-Garde including Italian Thought” auction organized by Christie’s on October 23 in Paris.

In 2015, a painting by Russian artist Mark Rothko sold for $81.9 million at Christie’s global auction.

Rothko’s painting exceeded pre-auction estimates of $45 million, and sales of 82 works at the post-war and contemporary art auction approached pre-auction estimates of $687 million, with only 12% of the works remaining unsold.

In 2012, an abstract painting by Rothko sold for $75.1 million at a New York auction.

Rothko’s painting titled “Red and Royal Blue,” described by Sotheby’s auction house as a “crowd masterpiece,” sparked a heated bidding war.

The price rose during the sale from $35 million to $50 million but failed to reach $86.9 million, the price achieved by another Rothko painting sold in May of the same year.

Rothko’s painting is one of eight selected for the artist’s 1954 “Landmarks” exhibition at the Chicago Art Institute, maintaining its classification for thirty years until it reached auction.

In May 2025, a painting by German artist Gerhard Richter, created in 2009, sold for $8.4 million at Christie’s New York auction, with an estimated price range of $7 to $10 million.

Gerhard Richter, born in 1932, is known for his style of realism and sometimes abstraction in his paintings, including the famous “Window” painting, and is also known for his portrait paintings.

After working as an advertising and theater painter, he studied at the Dresden Academy between 1952 and 1956, then moved to West Germany in 1961 and studied at the Düsseldorf Academy between 1961 and 1963.