A portrait of David Hockney painted by Lucian Freud (1922-2011) -one of the most important figurative artists in contemporary art- was auctioned in London for a sum that reached 20 millions of dollars.

The million-dollar transaction was carried out by the prestigious auctioneer Sotheby’s, who was in charge of auctioning the portrait made during a session of more than 100 hours. This creation is a testament to the long friendship between Hockney, that in addition to being a painter is a set designer, designer and photographer, with Freud, British nationalized and born in Berlin, Germany, the 8 from December to 1922 as one of Sigmund Freud's grandsons, the founder of psychoanalysis.

It is a painting that had not been exhibited in public since the Freud exhibition that the National Portrait Gallery made in the British capital a year after his death., so the sale was well above the estimated floor, of little more than 11 millions of dollars, reported the French news agency AFP.

In the paint, made between spring and summer of 2002 when Freud had a few 80 years and hockney 65, the person being portrayed appears with a slightly frowned brow and slightly tilted glasses, “in full reflection, showing your sympathy and curiosity”, Sotheby’s spokesmen indicated.

The play was, also, the latest in a series of portraits of illustrious models painted by Freud between 2001 Y 2002: from Queen Elizabeth II to Kate Moss, joining the hundreds of portraits of friends, lovers, aristocrats and artists he made during his career.

Beautiful Freud, daughter of the painter and witness of those encounters, added that “it was exciting to see them together, like the two cancheros at school, engrossed in each other's conversation. I liked that Hockney said that he enjoyed the slow progress of the painting because it allowed them to chat”.

After starting in surrealism, after the Second World War for which he left his native Berlin and went into exile in London with his family, Freud became one of the main representatives of English figurative painting, specialized in portraits that usually exclude the expression of feelings and contain a very perceptible carnality. While Hockney was a great pop artist in the years 60 and one of the most influential of the 20th century.