LONDON (AFP) — Claude Monet's painting "Le Bassin aux Nympheas" sold for 40.9 million pounds (51.7 million euros, 80.5 million dollars) at an auction in London on Tuesday, smashing the previous record auction price for the artist's work.
The painting by the French impressionist artist was sold to an unidentified woman in the front row of the auction room, an AFP journalist at the scene said.
"Le Bassin aux Nympheas" greatly exceeded its pre-sale estimate, which Christie's had pegged at between 18 and 24 million pounds.
Monet painted the masterpiece at his home in Giverny in 1919, and it is one of four that he signed and dated that year. Of the other three, one is held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, another has been divided, while the third is in private hands.
"We are extremely pleased to have seen this painting attract intense interest from the huge number of people who came to see the work on public exhibition ... and also the international clients who competed to buy the picture," said Olivier Camu, Christie's head of Impressionist and Modern Art.
The previous record for a Monet sold at auction was 41.4 million dollars for "Le Pont du chemin de fer a Argenteuil", established last month at a sale in New York.
Another highlight of Tuesday's auction was the sale of "Danseuse a la barre", a pastel by Edgar Degas, which sold for 13.5 million pounds, compared to its pre-sale estimate of between four and six million pounds.
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