Picasso breaks Australia record


Sylvette David was Picasso's 17-year-old neighbour in Valories France


An abstract painting by Picasso has sold in Sydney for $6.9m AUS (£3.32m) making it the most expensive piece of art sold at auction in Australia.
The 1954 painting Sylvette - featuring model and muse Sylvette David - sold to an anonymous overseas phone bidder at the Deutscher-Menzies Galleries.
One of 40 works inspired by David it was painted by Picasso when he was 73.
The sale broke the previous record of $3.48m AUS (£1.67m) set in 2007 for a work by Australia's Brett Whiteley.
"Sydney is the New York of the art market in the southern hemisphere" said Deutscher-Menzies Galleries spokeswoman Marie Geissler.
'Historic day'
Rodney Menzies the director of the gallery bought the Picasso two years ago for $4.6m (£2.2m).
"It's a historic day for Australia in the sense that a very significant international picture by the greatest artist of the 20th Century was sold at an Australian auction for a record price" Mr Menzies told Agence France Presse. Picasso came across Sylvette David his 17-year-old neighbour while living in the south of France. Her tall frame and long blond ponytail fascinated the Spanish cubist painter who died in 1973.