Manet Art Sold for Record $11 Million

A painting by Edouard Manet sold at auction Monday for more than $11 million, the highest price ever paid for an Impressionist painting.

Christie’s auction house said the winning bid of 7.7 million British pounds for “La Rue Mosnier aux Paveurs,” painted by the French master in 1878, was received by telephone from a European buyer whose name was not revealed.

In three minutes of intense bidding, the price grew in steps of 200,000 pounds from the opening 2 million pounds to 7 million, about double what the Manet was expected to bring.

The 1878 painting was from London’s Courtauld Collection and was sold on behalf of a descendant of Samuel Courtauld, who founded the collection and the Courtauld Institute of Art.

The previous Impressionist record was $9.9 million paid in New York last year for a Van Gogh. The largest sum for a painting ever paid at auction was 8.1 million pounds (about $12 million then) for Andrea Mantegna’s 15th-Century “Adoration of the Magi” last year.