NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pablo Picasso's "Boy with the Pipe" became the most expensive painting ever sold at auction on Wednesday when it fetched $104,168,000 at Sotheby's in New York.The previous auction record was held by van Gogh's "Portrait of Dr. Gachet" which sold for $82.5 million in 1990.
Sotheby's had estimated the Picasso oil on canvas at "in excess of $70 million." The price fetched on Wednesday included commission. The hammer price was $93 million.
The 1905 work was the highlight of Sotheby's sale of the collection of Mr. and Mrs. John Hay Whitney, which was being sold by the late couple's Greentree Foundation.
