Churchill sunset painting sells in New York for $350,000

A painting by Winston Churchill of a Moroccan sunset — a view he loved so much that he invited President Franklin D. Roosevelt to see it — has sold for $350,000, an auction company says.

''Sunset Over the Atlas Mountains,'' a vibrant landscape painted in 1935 from Churchill's balcony at the Mamounia Hotel in Marrakech, had been expected to bring at least $600,000 at the Bonhams New York auction house on Wednesday. The company's Web site announced the sale but didn't say who bought the painting.

Churchill invited Roosevelt to travel with him to Marrakech after a conference in Casablanca in 1943 so he could experience the beautiful view for himself.

After Churchill's death in 1965, the 20-by-24-inch oil painting went to a daughter, who sold it to a private collector in Texas. The collector sold it in 1992 to the family of the San Francisco owner who auctioned it Wednesday.

Churchill, who began painting for relaxation and loved working in brilliant colors, often did not sign his work, including ''Sunset,'' so as not to influence judges, Bonhams European paintings specialist Malcolm Walker said.

''He was as good as an amateur artist will get,'' Walker said before the sale.

A 1948 Churchill painting, ''Marrakech,'' depicting the city's gates against the backdrop of the Atlas mountains, sold at auction for about $950,000 in December 2007. Earlier that year, his painting ''Chartwell Landscape with Sheep'' sold for $2.06 million, a record for him.

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On the Net:

www.bonhams.com