Polish sale of Marilyn Monroe photographs by Milton H. Greene achieves $750,000

Art Daily Newsletter An auctioneer (R) gestures during an auction of photographs taken by late celebrity photographer Milton Greene in Warsaw, Poland. A total of 240 photos showing Marilyn Monroe and other Hollywood stars are up for bid, making it the largest ever sale of Greene's photos. Poland's state treasury obtained the candid Monroe shots among a collection of nearly 4,000 Greene photographs it received as part of a complicated 1995 settlement with a Polish foreign debt management agency. AFP PHOTO / JANEK SKARZYNSKI. By: Monika Scislowska, Associated Press

WARSAW (AP).- Who doesn't want a picture of Marilyn Monroe? Hundreds of photographs of the blonde bombshell and other celebrities, including famous ones of Monroe in bed and as a ballerina, were sold for some $750,000 Thursday evening at an auction house in Poland. Bidders and spectators packed the Desa Unicum house in Warsaw, where 238 pictures by the late American fashion and celebrity photographer Milton H. Greene were up for sale. Only one remained unsold, among some 500 bidders. The auction house said in a statement that the 2.4 million zlotys obtained made it the nation's biggest photo auction to date. Most of these pictures of Monroe were taken from 1953 to 1957 when Greene was her advisor and business partner. He made many of the prints during Monroe's lifetime and they are highly valued by collectors. They include series of refined black-and-white studio photos and shots taken in natural surroundings, sometime in provocative poses, some in color. As the bidding began, a ... More