Monet money

A view of the River Thames painted by Claude Monet has sold for almost £18m - more than twice its estimated price.

An anonymous telephone bidder paid £17,940,000 for Waterloo Bridge, Temps Couvert during a sale at Christie's auction house in London.

The sale - the second highest price fetched for a Monet - kicked off a week of huge sales on the London art market. Monet's Nympheas, an iconic image of water lilies, is expected to make £10-£15m at auction on Today.

It is one of only a few of the lily paintings still in private hands, and will go under the hammer at Sotheby's as part of the auction house's impressionist and modern art sale. The sale will also feature works by Henri Matisse, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Pablo Picasso.

Waterloo Bridge, Temps Couvert is one of a series of views of the bridge and river that Monet painted from his room at the Savoy Hotel around the start of the 20th Century.