Art world records were shattered last night when a painting by the US abstract artist Mark Rothko became the most expensive contemporary work ever to be sold at auction.

The $72.84 million selling price for the artist's 1950 work White Center (Yellow, Pink, Lavender on Rose) was nearly three times the $27.1 million previous record, set last November, for any post-war work selling at auction.

A painting by the British artist Francis Bacon, Study from Pope Innocent X, also smashed the record, selling for $52.68 million.

Overall, yesterday's sale at Sotheby’s in New York of contemporary and postwar art, the biggest in history, fetched $255 million - itself a record.

The most expensive contemporary painting ever sold was Jackson Pollock’s No. 5, 1948, which took $140 million in a private sale to an anonymous buyer in 2006. Two works by Pollock were however among yesterday evening’s few casualties. Neither approached its estimates and the auction house ended up owning both.

The Rothko and the Bacon far exceeded their pre-sale estimates. Experts said that the huge price tags ushered in a new world of higher prices for contemporary art.

“We’re obviously thrilled with the results,” said Tobias Meyer, Sotheby’s worldwide head of contemporary art, who also served as auctioneer.

The record results showed how "aggressive and strong" the contemporary art market was, Meyer said. He added that, like last week’s Impressionist and modern art sales, the auction was marked by lots of international bidding.

Records were set for 15 artists in all, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, whose untitled work from 1981 fetched $14.6 million including commission - about twice its estimate and nearly three times the artist’s old record. The work was being sold by the Israel Museum.

Other artists setting new records included Robert Rauschenberg, Richard Prince, Tom Wesselmann, Hans Hofmann, Morris Louis and Dan Flavin.

The Rothko was sold by philanthropist David Rockefeller, who attended the auction.

The sale, with 88 per cent of its 74 offerings finding buyers, took in $254,874,000, or just under its high pre-sale estimate. Both Sotheby’s and rival Christie’s had set unprecedented, and seemingly aggressive, prices in excess of $30 million for its top post-war works this season, but in the event those turned out to be conservative.

The astounding prices surprised even Sotheby’s officials. “We didn’t expect them to sell as well as they did,” Meyer said of the Rothko and Bacon paintings.

Anthony Grant, a senior international specialist for contemporary art, told the Reuters news agency that the spike in prices for top works “means that there clearly exists a huge interest in this field, and in the icons of contemporary art.

“When we can identify those icons, the sky can be the limit,” Grant said.

The spring sales end today with Christie’s contemporary and post-war sale, led by a $35 million Warhol from the late pop artist's Death and Disaster series.

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