Masters' art works command £30m

Joan Miro's The red, the blue, the fine hope fetched almost £3m

A sale of big-name Impressionist and Modern art works have been sold for more than £30m at a New York sale.

Paintings by Monet, Magritte and Miro were among the items that were snapped up by bidders at the Christie's sale.

Part of a composition by Impressionist master Monet fetched £2.2 million, while a piece by modernist Miro commanded a little under £3 million.

But attention will switch to Sotheby's on Wednesday, where Picasso's Boy With A Pipe is expected to make £56 million.

The star lot at Christie's evening sale in New York was Giorgio de Chirico's Il grande metafisico, which went under the hammer for £4 million - setting a record for the artist.

The work had been in the hands of the Museum of Modern Art (Moma) since 1958, when one of the building's architects donated it.

Pablo Picasso's Boy with a Pipe is expected to fetch up to £56m

A piece by Joan Miro - The red, the blue, the fine hope - achieved the second-highest price of the sale.

It was painted just before the Spaniard's emigration to the US, with bright colours referring to his hope and anticipation at arriving in the country.

But a Picasso, a Mogdiliani and a late Picasso portrait were not snapped up.

The Mogdiliani was "just too expensive on the night", said Christie's honorary chairman and auctioneer Christopher Burge.

Picasso's work is widely expected to become the most expensive piece of art ever sold, exceeding the £46 million benchmark set by Van Gogh's Portrait of Dr Gachet.

The sale has been described as a "once in a lifetime" opportunity by David Norman, Sotheby's senior vice-president.