Dubai based British artist, Sacha Jafri took over the ballroom of Dubai’s Atlantis, The Palm to produce the largest painting ever created on canvas. Seven months, 1,065 paint brushes, 6,300 liters of paint and $62 million dollars later, Sacha Jafri has pulled off one of the art world’s greatest feats with the sale of his record-breaking canvas The Journey of Humanity.
From April until September, the British contemporary artist used the ballroom of Dubai’s Atlantis, The Palm to make the world’s largest canvas – officially certified by Guinness World Records – measuring 1,800 square meters and spanning more than two football fields placed end to end.
The 1800-square-metres artwork was cut into 70 separate panels, which painter Sacha Jafri auctioned off in the hope of raising $30 million for charity. However, the piece was sold in its entirety to Andre Abdoune, Chief Executive Officer of Altius Gestion International Holding, during an auction in Dubai on Monday for a staggering $62 million.
The funds will be split between Dubai Cares, Unicef, Unesco, Global Gift Foundation, as well as the Ministry of Tolerance and Coexistence and the Ministry of Education in the UAE. One of the programs to benefit will be Unicef’s Giga project, an initiative launched last year alongside the International Telecommunication Union with the aim of connecting every school in the world to the internet.