Warhol’s ‘Silver Car Crash’ sells for record $105m

The last of four in a series of Andy Warhol paintings depicting car crashes shattered the pop artist’s auction record, selling for more than $105m (€78m), Sotheby’s said.

Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster), signed and part of his 1963 Death and Disasters series, fetched $105,445,000 with three bidders vying for the buy in New York, the auction house said in a statement.

The 2.43-metre tall and 4m (over 8x13ft) wide work has two panels: to the left a series of 15 images of a car crash, and to the right, a large silvery rectangle. It is an imposing work experts describe as trailblazing and a cinematic allusion to death on a silver screen.