Churchill’s Wartime Marrakech Painting, Owned by Jolie, Could Fetch Record $3.5 Million at Auction

This landscape of Marrakech, painted in 1943 by Churchill and given to US President Franklin Roosevelt, is being sold by Angelina Jolie for an estimated amount between $2.1 and $3.4 million, reports Reuters. According to Nicholas Orchard, head of the British modern art department at Christie’s, this painting is the only one painted by Churchill during World War II. "There is a much greater global interest, especially for Churchill," he noted.

For Christie’s, the auction house, the British Prime Minister invested heavily in painting from the age of 40 and visited Morocco for the first time in 1935, where he painted about 45 paintings of the country.

In 1943, the two leaders then went to Marrakech after the Casablanca conference so that Roosevelt could discover the beauty of the city. At the Mamounia where Churchill was staying, the painting was painted and given to the American president.

Two years after Roosevelt’s death, this painting was sold by his son. According to the same media, the painting has had several other buyers before Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt bought it in 2011.