One Lion Set to Save Many Other Wild Cats

A rare Rembrandt drawing, Young Lion Resting, could fetch up to $20 million at auction, with proceeds supporting wild cat conservation charity Panthera.

Rembrandt's 'Young Lion Resting'

Over the past two decades, the billionaire entrepreneur Thomas S. Kaplan and his wife Daphne have amassed around 220 works of 17th-century Dutch art that they call the Leiden Collection (named after Rembrandt's birthplace). Now they are ready to part with one of their earliest acquisitions: Rembrandt’s life-like drawing Young Lion Resting (around 1638-42). Sotheby's will auction the drawing early next year, and all the proceeds will go to Panthera.

According to The Art Newspaper, the Kaplans acquired the drawing in 2005, but they have chosen to sell the work now to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Kaplans’ founding of the organisation back in 2006. Kaplan expects the publicity of the sale itself to help promote Panthera’s mission. “It’s going to be one of the most expensive drawings ever,” he says. “That attracts people’s attention.”

Young Lion Resting is the “the best Rembrandt drawing to come on the market in a long time”, says Gregory Rubenstein, Sotheby’s worldwide head of Old Master drawings. He says the drawing, which he believes was drawn from life, could attract both private and institutional buyers, including everyone from collectors interested in Rembrandt to those enthralled by “the immediacy of the image”.

Prior to the New York sale, Sotheby’s will take Young Lion Resting on an extensive global tour, starting in Paris and including stops in New York, London, Abu Dhabi, Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia, before returning to Manhattan in time for the bidding to start on 4 February 2026. For the benefit of wild cats, let's hope it exceeds its $20 million estimate.