A 1940 self-portrait by famed Mexican artist Frida Kahlo has sold for $US54.7 million ($A84.2 million) at a New York art auction, becoming the top sale price for a work by any female artist.

The painting of Kahlo asleep in a bed - titled El sueño (La cama) or in English, The Dream (The Bed) - surpassed the record held by Georgia O'Keeffe's Jimson Weed/White Flower No.1, which sold for $US44.4 million in 2014.

The sale at Sotheby's also topped Kahlo's own auction record for a work by a Latin American artist.

The 1949 painting Diego and I, depicting Kahlo and her husband, muralist Diego Rivera, went for $US34.9 million in 2021. Her paintings are reported to have sold privately for even more.

The self-portrait is among the few Kahlo pieces that have remained in private hands outside Mexic

See Full Page