$135 million payday

Cosmetics magnate Ronald S. Lauder has paid $135 million for the 1907 Gustav Klimt portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer that arrived in Los Angeles in April. The masterpiece and four other Klimt paintings had been seized by the Nazis from Bloch-Bauer's family in Vienna during World War II. In January an Austrian court restored ownership to relatives led by Maria Altmann of Los Angeles. The Klimts were brought here and will be on display at LACMA through June 30, then move to Lauder's Neue Galerie in Manhattan, the New York Times says. Los Angeles Times staffer Anne-Marie O'Connor has a book deal to write about the saga.