Spain Buys a Goya to Save It

LONDON — In an extraordinary agreement, Spain paid British Lord Wimborne $6 million for a Goya masterpiece rather than see the painting auctioned for a probable record price, the two parties said today.

Christie’s art auction house had planned to sell the 1805 Goya portrait of the Marquesa de Santa Cruz on Friday for as much as $12 million. Ownership of the masterpiece was never challenged, but Spain had contended it was smuggled out of the country with “bogus” export documents.