Despite some improvements in recent years, the art world, like many sectors, is still largely dominated by men. The disparity that reigns in the art world has fortunately captured the attention of the public, and encouraging sales have shaken up the ranking of the most highly-prized visual artists at auction. Here are the top 15 female artists and their most expensive works.
15. Cady Noland, Bluewald
The DC-born artist Cady Noland (b. 1956) focuses mainly on sculpture and contrary to the myth of the "American dream", on what she calls "the American nightmare". She strives to denounce the darkest sides of America through research on its difficulties and social inequalities. Art runs in the family: her father is Color Field artist Kenneth Noland.
Bluewald (1989), a screen print on aluminum, illustrates Lee Harvey Oswald, who assassinated President John F. Kennedy. He appears in this portrait shortly before being shot by Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner. The work was sold at Christie's in 2011 for $9.8 million.
14. Julie Mehretu, Walkers With the Dawn and Morning
Born in Ethiopia and raised in Michigan, Julie Mehretu (b. 1970) has long been fascinated by urban layout, street grids and human geography in her work. At Sotheby's Now Evening auction in November 2023, her Walkers With the Dawn and Morning sold for $10.7 million, setting a record for her, as well as for any work by an African-born artist. Her abstract ink and acrylic on canvas masterpiece had been painted in 2008 for the New Orleans Biennial to help revive the city's art and cultural offerings after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. The title comes from a poem by Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes.
See also: 14 Black Artists Who Changed Art History
13. Natalia Goncharova, Les Fleurs
Russian avant-garde artist Natalia Sergeevna Goncharova (1881-1962) was a painter, scenographer, costume designer and illustrator, but came to be known for her works inspired by Futurism and Cubism. At Christie's in 2008, her work Les Fleurs (1912) was sold for just over $10.8 million.
See also: Futurism: A Break From the Past
12. Berthe Morisot, Après le déjeuner
Born in Paris in 1841, Berthe Morisot (1841-1895) was part of the Impressionist movement, a circle she frequented for a long time, notably alongside Édouard Manet and his brother Eugene (her husband). Morisot's motif almost exclusively depicted the bourgeois woman's private and social sphere with sensitive light and pastel colors. When she produced Après le déjeuner (After lunch) in 1881, Berthe was at the height of her Impressionist period (1875-1885).
The work was sold at Christie's London in 2013 for $11 million. At the time it was painted, her contemporaries described it as "the Impressionist painting par excellence."
11. Barbara Hepworth, The Family of Man: Ancestor II
Four bronze examples were created in 1974 of Barbara Hepworth's sculpture The Family of Man: Ancestor II. One of these four was auctioned in November 2023 for $11.6 million at Christie's 20th Century Evening Sale in New York, setting a record for the British sculptor. Interestingly, this came exactly a year to the day after Hepworth's previous auction record was set, when Elegy III fetched $8.6 million at Christie's Paul G. Allen Collection auction.
10. Lee Krasner, The Eye is the First Circle
During her lifetime, Lee Krasner (1908-1984) received less attention than she deserved because she was married to renowned artist Jackson Pollock and was arguably in his larger-than-life shadow. However, the artistic couple was inspired by each other and Krasner's departure from Cubism influenced Pollock's early painting. In fact, Krasner who was one of the pioneers of action painting, the method that Jackson Pollock later promoted.
See also: 10 Artist Couples You Should Know
In 2019, Lee Krasner's work The Eye is the First Circle (1960) sold for $11.6 million, cementing her as one of the most expensive female artists at auction.
9. Jenny Saville, Propped
Jenny Saville (b. 1970) is the second most expensive living female artist at auction. In November 2018, the Scottish artist's oil painting Propped sold at Sotheby's for $12.4 million. This fleshy and voluptuous self-portrait came from the collection of former MoMA director David Teiger. Saville's work focuses on the female body depicted on monumental canvases and challenges the stereotypes of female beauty.
See also: The 10 Most Expensive Living Artists
8. Marlene Dumas, Miss January
In May 2025, South African artist Marlene Dumas became the world’s most expensive living female artist when her 1997 painting Miss January sold for $13.6 million at Christie’s. Previously part of the renowned Don and Mera Rubell Collection, the work broke Dumas’s former auction record of $6.3 million, set in 2008 by The Visitor at Sotheby’s London. The landmark sale was widely regarded as a strong indicator of the increasing demand for work by female artists in the global art market.
7. Agnes Martin, Grey Stone II
Abstract minimalist Agnes Martin's Grey Stone II (1961), composed of oil, gold leaf and pencil on canvas, achieved $18.7 million over an estimate of $6-8 million at the sale of art patron Emily Fisher Landau's collection at Sotheby's in November 2023. Discerning collectors competed for this rare work, one of just five in which the artist used gold leaf in her famous grids. The Museum of Modern Art in New York and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art each hold one of the five and the other two are much smaller than this 72-inch version.
6. Tamara de Lempicka, Portrait of Marjorie Ferry
Tamara de Lempicka's Portrait of Marjorie Ferry, an oil on canvas from 1932, became the artist's most expensive work in February 2020, selling for $21.2 million.
See also: Art Deco: The Great Celebration
This sumptuous portrait testifies to the chic and inimitable style of the artist, who left Poland for France, and later the United States. After the death of her first husband, Lempicka married the aristocrat whom she had first taken for lover and because of her new title, was nicknamed "The Baroness with a brush." The portrait was commissioned by a wealthy businessman, who asked Lempicka to represent his wife Marjorie Ferry, a British cabaret singer, with the precious cabochon ring he had recently given her.
5. Leonora Carrington, Les Distractions des Dagobert
Arguably the most anticipated painting in Sotheby's May 2024 New York sales was Les Distractions de Dagobert, the magnus opus of surrealist Leonora Carrington, which sold for $28.5 million, more than double its estimate. After leaving her native England for Mexico City in the 1940s, Carrington painted the surrealist symphony, drawing inspiration from the medieval Celtic imagery of her childhood and the Mayan mythology of her adopted homeland, as well as the dream-like visions conjured during her time spent in a mental asylum. With the record-breaking sale of her major masterpiece, Carrington's role as a pioneering surrealist and committed feminist is brought into the spotlight, fittingly in 2024, which marks the 100th anniversary of André Breton's Surrealist Manifesto.
See also: 6 Female Artists and the Male Muses Who Inspired Them
4. Joan Mitchell, Untitled
Joan Mitchell (1925-1992), an American Abstract Expressionist, is one of the most expensive female artists at auction, with her works selling into the eight figures. In November 2023, her personal record was set when Untitled, representative of her Abstract Expressionist style in gripping shades of crimson, purple, khaki green and deep blue, sold for $29.1 million.
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3. Louise Bourgeois, Spider
Louise Bourgeois' (1911-2010) Spider (1996) became the most expensive sculpture by a contemporary female artist, selling for $32 million in 2019. Gracefully perched in a threatening pose, Spider seems poised to attack at any moment, while one of the legs stretches forward to reach its prey. Triggering a panel of emotions ranging from childish reverie to primary fear, the spider is a deeply personal creation for Bourgeois, who has associated the arachnid with the maternal figure.
See also: 12 Women Who Rocked the Art World
Louise Bourgeois initially studied painting only, but came to sculpture on the advice of Fernand Léger. She got her big break with a retrospective exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in 1982, which was also the museum's first solo exhibition of a female artist.
2. Georgia O'Keeffe, Jimson Weed / White Flower no. 1
In 2014, Jimson Weed / White Flower No. 1 by Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1986) sold for $44.4 million at Sotheby's, crowning her the most expensive female artist at the time.
See also: Georgia O'Keeffe's Lost Paradise
O'Keeffe is mainly known for her paintings depicting flowers and plants rendered in lush colors and zoomed-in forms. She was noticed in 1928, when six of her flower paintings sold for $25,000 (about $317,000 in 2019 dollars), which was the highest paid amount for a work by an American artist at this time.
1. Frida Kahlo, El sueño (La cama)
See also: Frida Kahlo: Colourful Portraitist and Social Commentator
In November 2025, Georgia O’Keeffe’s eleven-year run at the top of this list came to an end when Frida Kahlo’s extraordinary 1940 self-portrait El sueño (La cama) sold for $54.7 million at Sotheby’s New York. The remarkable result exceeded the Mexican artist’s previous record, which had been set in November 2021 at Sotheby’s with Diego y yo, by about $20 million. The $34.9 million achieved at that earlier sale had already quadrupled Kahlo’s prior auction record.
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This article was updated on 05/12/2025.
