Freud picture in £17m record sale

9:35am Wednesday 14th May 2008

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A life-size Lucian Freud painting of a naked Jobcentre supervisor sleeping broke the world auction record for a work by a living artist when it sold for more than £17 million, Christie's said.

The masterpiece, which was sold by a private European collector, fetched 33.6 million dollars (£17.2 million) in the sale at New York's Rockefeller Centre.

Benefits Supervisor Sleeping beat the previous world auction record for a work by a living artist, held by Jeff Koons' Hanging Heart (Magenta/Gold), which fetched 23.5 million dollars (£11.3 million) last year.

The 1995 Freud painting depicts rotund London benefits supervisor Sue Tilley, now 51, sleeping on a dilapidated sofa.

Ms Tilley, now a Jobcentre manager, said: "I'm thrilled. I still can't believe such a bizarre thing has happened to me. It hasn't sunk in properly."

Asked how she felt about posing nude, she said: "At first, I was a little bit embarrassed but after a while I just got used to it and it became a completely normal thing to do, like going to the doctor."

She also said reports claiming that she had weighed 20st when she posed for the painting were inaccurate and said she did not know how much she weighed today. "I never weigh myself because I can't be bothered," she said.

Asked if she would ever sit for another artist, Ms Tilley said it was "hard to know where to go" as she had "started with the very best".

It was the first time Freud's Benefits Supervisor Sleeping, which was the highlight of Christie's New York Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale, had appeared at auction.

The 85-year-old British artist first painted "Big Sue" in Evening In The Studio (1993), for which Ms Tilley had to lie in an uncomfortable pose on a bare floor. Freud then bought the ragged sofa depicted in the 1995 painting for Ms Tilley, who was introduced to Freud by Australian performance artist Leigh Bowery, to lie on.

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