Jeune Tahitienne

This crude wooden bust of a Tahitian girl by Paul Gauguin - Jeune Tahitienne - fetched $11.3m (£6.8m) at Sotheby's in New York on Tuesday. He carved it and threaded the coral and shell necklaces on his first trip to Tahiti, from 1891 to 1893. On his return to France he gave the bust to a friend's 10-year-old daughter, Jeanne Fournier, whom he had promised a gift from the South Seas. She sold it in a Sotheby's London auction in 1961. This is the first time it has come up for sale since then. So its provenance is excellent. But fancy paying over $11m for a cheapskate gift for a young girl!