Big Sue sells for a hefty $33.6m

If there is a recession looming, no one seems to have informed the art world. On Tuesday the British painter Lucien Freud broke the world record for money paid for a work by a living artist when his monumental portrait, Benefits Supervisor Sleeping (pictured), sold for $33.6m at Christie's International in New York. The 1995 life-size work, which depicts a voluptuous amateur model reclining on a couch, far exceeded the $23.5m paid for Jeff Koon's Hanging Heart last year. The painting went to an undisclosed telephone bidder, believed to be an American.

No one will be more surprised at the painting's price tag than its subject, Sue Tilley, 51, who is now the manager of a government-run job centre in London. She posed for Freud, the grandson of Sigmund Freud, on a daily rate of £20. The money was of a little matter to her, however. She recently said: "The best thing was I got lovely lunches. I got taken to the River Cafe most weekends. It was worth it for that. It was just fantastic. You know, so many people would love to have that experience, to work with such a great artist, and chat to them, find out about them and see what they were doing.”

Freud, 85, who is considered to be Britain's greatest living realist painter, was not the only artist to gain in reputation on Tuesday. The top lot at Christie's, a 1952 Mark Rothko painting, had been expected to achieve $40m, but fetched $50.4m.