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AlUla's Hegra after Dark: Where History Meets Innovation

AlUla continues to captivate visitors with a unique blend of historical wonders and cutting-edge technology. (SPA)
AlUla continues to captivate visitors with a unique blend of historical wonders and cutting-edge technology. (SPA)
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AlUla's Hegra after Dark: Where History Meets Innovation

AlUla continues to captivate visitors with a unique blend of historical wonders and cutting-edge technology. (SPA)
AlUla continues to captivate visitors with a unique blend of historical wonders and cutting-edge technology. (SPA)

AlUla continues to captivate visitors with a unique blend of historical wonders and cutting-edge technology. One exceptional experience is "Hegra After Dark", part of the Ancient Kingdoms Festival, The Saudi Press Agency said on Monday.
This innovative and immersive program explores the rise and fall of civilizations throughout history in a captivating way.
Held at Hegra, the first Saudi UNESCO World Heritage Site, the experience offers dazzling drone shows.
As part of the "Stories from the Sky" event, these drones illuminate the site's landmarks with breathtaking light formations, adding a new dimension to the historical site and creating an unprecedented visual spectacle.
Beyond the "Hegra After Dark", AlUla offers a diverse calendar of events, enabling visitors to delve deeper into the region's rich culture, heritage, and natural beauty.

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Magritte Painting Nets Auction Record of $121 Million

Rene Magritte's "L'empire des lumières" is on display during a press preview for Christie's Fall 20/21 Marquee Week in New York, November 8, 2024. (AFP)
Rene Magritte's "L'empire des lumières" is on display during a press preview for Christie's Fall 20/21 Marquee Week in New York, November 8, 2024. (AFP)
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Magritte Painting Nets Auction Record of $121 Million

Rene Magritte's "L'empire des lumières" is on display during a press preview for Christie's Fall 20/21 Marquee Week in New York, November 8, 2024. (AFP)
Rene Magritte's "L'empire des lumières" is on display during a press preview for Christie's Fall 20/21 Marquee Week in New York, November 8, 2024. (AFP)

A painting by Rene Magritte shattered an auction record for the surrealist artist on Tuesday, selling for more than $121 million at Christie's in New York.

The seminal 1954 painting had been valued at $95 million, and the previous record for a work by Magritte (1898-1967) was $79 million, set in 2022.

After a nearly 10-minute bidding war on Tuesday, "Empire of Light" ("L'Empire des lumieres") was sold for $121,160,000, "achieving a world-record price for the artist and for a surrealist work of art at auction", according to auction house Christie's.

The painting -- depicting a house at night, illuminated by a lamp post, while under a bright, blue sky -- is one of a series by the Belgian artist showing the interplay of shadow and light.

"Empire of Light" was part of the private collection of Mica Ertegun, an interior designer who fled communist Romania to settle in the United States where she became an influential figure in the arts world.

She died in late 2023 and was married to the late Ahmet Ertegun, the music magnate who founded the Atlantic Records label.

The sale of the Magritte painting was an expected highlight of this week's autumn sales season in New York, at a time when the art market has seen a slowdown since last year.

Christie's -- which is controlled by Artemis, the investment holding company owned by the Pinault family -- said sales totaled $2.1 billion in the first half of this year.

That is down for the second straight year, after a peak of $4.1 billion in 2022 as the world emerged from the coronavirus pandemic.

During the same Christie's auction on Tuesday, a celebrated 1964 painting of a gas station by 86-year-old Ed Ruscha, titled "Standard Station, Ten-Cent Western Being Torn in Half," sold for $68.26 million, setting a new auction record for the American pop artist.