What does a notorious gold toilet and a nearly destroyed Klimt painting have in common? They christened Sotheby’s first sale out of its new US headquarters in New York on Tuesday evening in a buzzy, record-breaking night.

Early on, the headlining artwork by Gustav Klimt, “Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer,” became the most valuable work of modern art to ever sell at auction, reaching $236.4 million to gasps and applause from the room during the 20-minute bidding war. It was also the most expensive work of art ever sold by Sotheby’s globally. The portrait of Klimt’s patrons’ young daughter, made in the last years of the artist’s life, was spared from destruction during World War II when it was separated from his works that later burned during a fire at Immendorf Castle in Austria.

The a

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