European Art Buyers Make Most of Weak Dollar

European art lovers and investors are taking advantage of the cheap dollar to buy back some of the hundreds of thousands of works that have crossed the Atlantic over decades.

Nicholas Hall, international director of Christie's New York, said that European activity was "exceptionally strong" at this week's auction of Old Mas ters, where six new world auction records were set.

Among canvasses bought by Europeans was a Venetian view by Canaletto's disciple, Francesco Guardi, which fetched $2.1m (£1.1m) and The Madonna of Humility with Saint Catherine by the 14th-century Florentine master, Agnolo Gaddi, which went for $486,000.

The Louvre secured a work by the French Baroque painter, Nicolas Chaperon. European bidders, flush with dollars, pushed US buyers into paying prices well above estimates.

Filippino Lippi's The Penitent Mary Magdalen adoring the True Cross, which had been estimated at up to $1.2m sold for £2.3m - the highest price ever paid for a work by the artist.

The weak dollar offers European buyers some remarkable bargains.

At Sotheby's Old Masters sale in New York, a Botticelli sold for the equivalent of £246,000.

Sources said Italians were particularly active buyers. Italy having produced so much good art, there are plenty of works for Italians to repatriate. Others factors too are at work.

Italians have traditionally been keen bond investors. But in the 1990s, as Italy reshaped its economy for entry into the euro, bond yields fell along with interest rates. Many switched to shares , losing heavily when markets round the world collapsed in 2000-2001. Since then they have put a lot of their surplus cash into bricks and mortar and, most recently, art.