Damien Hirst work becomes most expensive ever for living artist

A work by artist Damien Hirst, famed for preserving a shark in formaldehyde, on Thursday became the most expensive by a living artist ever sold at auction.

"Lullaby Spring" - a three-metre (10-foot) wide steel cabinet containing 6,136 hand-crafted and individually-painted pills -- sold for 9.65 million pounds (14.4 million euros, 19.2 million dollars) to an anonymous collector, auction house Sotheby's said.



The 2002 work, which is part of a series of stainless steel cabinets that are an allegory for the four seasons, was expected to sell for up to four million pounds, and beat the previous record of 17.4 million dollars for a work by Jasper Johns sold at Christie's in New York last month.

It was sold as part of Sotheby's Contemporary Art sale in London, which included the sale of a 1978 self-portrait by Francis Bacon, which sold for 21.58 million pounds - nearly double the expected price of up to 12 million pounds.