Picasso sets art auction record

Picasso's Les Femmes d'Alger, Version O, recently sold for $179,365,00 to an undisclosed buyer. The painting is from a series of works started in late 1954 inspired by Delacroix's 1834 'oriental' painting, The women of Algiers in their Apartment. It is believed he also did the series in response to the death of his friend and rival Henri Matisse the year before, who was famous for his odalisques, as was Delacroix. "When Matisse died he left his odalisques to me as a legacy," joked Picasso. The painting had previously sold at auction in 1997 for $31.9 million.  

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