Claude Monet's Le Grand Canal (1908) was the top lot of Sotheby's impressionist and modern art evening auction in London on February 3 with a final bid of £23.6m ($35.5m).

The sale proved the biggest ever held in the capitol, pulling in £170.2m ($258.3m).

Monet travelled to Venice for the first and last time in 1908

Le Grand Canal was one of five paintings by Monet to star, which sold for a combined £55.3m ($84m).

Helena Newman, Sotheby's joint head of impressionist & modern art, commented prior to the sale: "The market for works by Claude Monet has now reached an all-time point of strength, with bidders coming from four times as many countries as a decade ago."

Henri Matisse's Odalisque au Fauteuil Noir achieved the second highest bid of the night. It sold for £15.8m ($23.7m), an increase of 31.6% on a £12m ($18m) estimate.

The work was described by the house as "one of the finest of the artist's celebrated 'Odalisque' paintings to come to the market."

The record for Matisse's work stands at $46.2m, set for Les coucous, tapis bleu et rose at Christie's in 2009.

Harry Smith, managing director of art advisory Gurr Johns, told Bloomberg News: "There were no fireworks, but there was no picture here that was massively underpriced such that it would cause fireworks."

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