The Leica
O-Series model – one of just over 20 ever made – became the most expensive
camera in the world when it sold for €2,160,000 at the Westlicht auction in
Vienna, Austria,
‘In an
exciting bidding war between the room, phone and internet bidders, the price of
the camera climbed to a new world record,’ said a spokesman for the auction.
The bidding
started at €300,000, but the camera ended up fetching more than seven times
that figure.
Last year,
another in the ‘O’ series went under the hammer for around £1.15m. It was bought by someone in the ‘Far East’.
The Leica
O-series cameras preceded the production-line Leica 1 models that launched the
35mm film format for still photography.
They were
developed as a second stage – after the first concept, the Ur Leica – to test the
market for such cameras.
Only around
20 were made in 1923-24.
