Costliest photographs of the world

Art history was made when an anonymous buyer paid a record-breaking $4.34 million for Andreas Gursky's photograph of the Rhine River, called Rhein II. Sold at Christie's impressionist and modern art auction in New York, it became the most expensive photograph ever sold at auction. It beat Cindy Sherman's Untitled #96, which sold for a whopping $3.89 million this May. Gursky's print, made in 1999, and depicts a stunning panorama of Germany's most famous river.

Here are some of the most expensive photographs ever sold

Robert Mapplethorpe's photo of Andy Warhol (1987) sold for $6,43,200 in 2006

Eugène Atget's Joueur d'Orgue (1898-1899) sold for $6,86,500 in 2010

Gustave Le Gray's The Great Wave, Sete (1857) sold for $8,38,000 in 1999

Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey's 113. Athènes, T[emple] de J[upiter] olympien pris de l'est (1842) sold for $922,488 in 2003

Peter Lik's photo One (2010) sold for $1 million in 2010

Edward Weston's Nautilus (1927) sold for for $1,082,500 in 2010

Richard Avedon's photo Dovima with Elephants (1955) sold for $1,151,976 in 2010

Richard Prince's untitled photo of a cowboy (1989) sold for $1,248,000 in 2005

Alfred Stieglitz's Georgia O'Keeffe (Hands) (1919) sold for $1,470,000 in 2006

Edward Weston's photo of a nude (1925) sold for $1,609,000 in 2008

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's photo Kremlin of Tobolsk (2009) sold for $1,750,000 in 2010

Edward Steichen's The Pond-Moonlight (1904) sold for $2,928,000 in 2006

Andreas Gursky's 99 Cent II Diptychon (2001) sold for $3,346,456 in 2006

Cindy Sherman's Untitled #96 (1981) sold for $3,890,500 in 2011

Andreas Gursky's Rhein II (1999) sold for $4,338,500 in 2011