John Constable's "The Lock" sold for $35 million, a record for the artist and one of the most expensive British paintings ever sold, according to ArtInfo.
The painting was sold by Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza, a Spanish Baroness, through Christie's auction house.
Her decision to sell the painting caused an uproar in her home country, with people calling it called it a "moral shame" that it would leave Spain, according to The Telegraph.
One member of the board of the Madrid art museum where the painting had hung even resigned in protest.
The baroness claimed she decided to sell the 1824 masterpiece in order to make some needed cash during Spain's liquidity crisis. She had acquired it as part of a collection from her late husband, Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza.
The buyer of the painting remains unknown.
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