Bacon breaks new records at Sotheby’s

Two works by Francis Bacon were the highlights of a record-breaking contemporary art sale at Sotheby's New York last night. Three bidders fought over his Self Portrait (right) which eventually went for $29.5m (£14.3m) - almost twice the estimate - while five interested parties went after Bullfight No 1, second version. It sold for $41m. There was a huge cheer in the auction room - a sign of general relief that, following a good sale at Christie's the night before, the fallout from the recent credit market fiasco seems to have bypassed the art world.

Indeed, the sale of Jeff Koons's Hanging Heart sculpture for $23.5m helped Sotheby's reach its highest ever total for an auction of contemporary and postwar work.

Meanwhile, at a less prestigious sale at Christie's yesterday an Andy Warhol portrait of Conrad Black was sold to a Los Angeles art dealer who didn't realise who the subject of the painting was. Michael Kohn paid $240,000 for the silkscreen print - beating the Christie's pre-sale upper estimate of $200,000 - before a friend told him: "That's Conrad Black - he's notorious".

Kohn said he had bid for the Warhol for "purely aesthetic" reasons. "It is a strikingly strong portrait," he said.

This might be music to Conrad Black's ears as he awaits sentencing on his fraud conviction. But the fact that the painting sold well is actually bad news for the disgraced media baron. As The First Post reported before the sale, Black has negotiated to keep for himself another painting in the series - and the price he must pay for it will be determined by the latest market value. ·