'Huge fan' buys it for £1,700

The Ricky Gervais painting that failed to sell last week has finally found a buyer.

The comic had donated his Sunset Cityscape to an Inverness gallery to help raise money for charity – but by the time the exhibition and auction closed, no one had put in an offer.

However, the publicity that news generated revived interest among fans – and now an unnamed photographer from Inverness has snapped up the piece for £1,700.

Inchmore Gallery owner Jane Owen Inglis posted on Facebook: ‘After being inundated with phone calls since the end of the exhibition I am as please as Punch to announce that the Ricky Gervais painting has been sold to a HUGE fan of his.’

The money from the sale of the 1.5x1m acrylic on canvas work will go Maggie’s Caring Cancer Centres.

The Inchmore exhibition showcased artists who had been affected by the disease, and Gervais’s mother died of lung cancer in 2000. Inglis had said of Gervais’s piece: ‘Although it wont be to everybody’s taste there is no doubt it is an interesting and well executed piece of art.’

Published: 12 Jul 2012