Solid Sales at Christie's London Auction

Jeff Koons's "Balloon Flower (Magenta)" (1995-2000) sold for $25.6 million at Christie's Post-War and Contemporary Art evening sale in London yesterday. The piece, which has been on display in London's St. James's Square for a week, had been estimated at $24 million.

Other highlights of the sale were Francis Bacon's "Three Studies for Self-Portrait" (1975), which sold for $34.3 million, and Lucian Freud's "Naked Portrait with Reflection," painted in 1980, which sold for $23.4 million. The works were estimated at $20 million and between $20 million and $29 million, respectively.

In total, the sale generated more than $171 million for Christie's.