Female artist's painting sets auction record

The painting was bought by an Argentine businessman

A painting by a Lancashire-born artist has sold for over £22 million.

Sotheby's said the sale of Leonora Carrington's Les Distractions de Dagobert in New York meant she had become the most valuable British-born female artist at auction.

The surrealist painting was bought for $28.5m (£22.48m), which exceeded Carrington's previous record of $3.3m (£2.6m) set at the auction house in 2022.

Carrington was born in Chorley on 6 April 1917 and later lived in Mexico, alongside female surrealists including Frida Kahlo and Remedios Varo.

'Iconic painting'

The painting was bought by Argentine businessman Eduardo F Costantini, founder of the Museum of Latin American Art of Buenos Aires, at the Sotheby's modern auction in New York

Mr Costantini said: "An iconic painting, The Distractions of Dagobert is one the most admired works in the history of surrealism, and an unparalleled masterpiece of Latin American art."

He said he was the underbidder when Carrington reached the artist’s record 30 years ago and at the latest auction had once again made a new auction record.

"This masterpiece will be part of a collection where, amongst others, two important works by Remedios Varo and another record-breaking Frida Kahlo are also found," he added.

Painted two years after Carrington’s arrival in Mexico in 1945, the psychedelic scenes are inspired by the life of Frankish ruler Dagobert, who lived in the seventh century.

It shows extinct volcanoes, a lake of fire engulfing an inverted idol, and a watery world where a giant with a double animal head holds a human-faced puffer fish.

Carrington died in 2011 at the age of 94.