New York | A brilliant blue painting by Pablo Picasso of his young mistress was crowned the prized lot of the November auction season so far after it sold at Sotheby’s in New York on Wednesday for $US139.4 million ($214.7 million), with buyer’s fees.

Completed during one of the most intense years of the artist’s personal life, the 1932 portrait of Picasso’s great muse, Marie-Thérèse Walter, remained on the auction block for four minutes as three collectors over the phones from around the world fought to establish control.