Orange, Red, Yellow - Mark Rothko

Price in US $ - 86 million

Orange, Red, Yellow, a 1961 Color Field painting by Mark Rothko, has become the most expensive post-war work sold at auction. The painting's trio of orange and yellow rectangles bobbing atop a cherry-red background forms a palette that's as eye-catching as a sunset or a Popsicle. Rothko's shimmering "colour field" paintings have never been as attention grabbing as his macho Action Painting contemporaries Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock.

These subtly spiritual works, when properly lit, are thought to offer a similar lofty experience that one gets in a place of worship, like a cathedral. Only their refusal to associate with language, or any period in art history, mean they transcend the specificity of religion.

No. 5, 1948 - Jackson Pollock

Price in US $ - 140,000,000

No. 5, 1948 - an abstract painting by Jackson Pollock, an American painter known for his contributions to the abstract expressionist movement, was done on an 8' x 4' sheet of fiberboard, with thick amounts of brown and yellow paint drizzled on top of it, forming a nest-like appearance.The Pollock work features the US artist's famous drip-and-pour style. Jackson Pollock's work had a major influence on art in the latter half of the 20th Century, sparking the emergence of abstract expressionism. The artist battled alcoholism and depression and is generally regarded as a self-destructive, tortured genius. He died in a car crash in 1956, aged 44.