Keith Vaughan's The Bar II headlined a sale of Modern British and Irish Art at Sotheby's on November 19, achieving £290,500 ($453,500) against an estimate of £120,000 ($187,332).
Sotheby's describes the work as depicting "five pale, ghost-like figures sitting in silence around the bar in an atmosphere of dark ennui.
 Keith Vaughan's The Bar II was executed in 1953 |
"They do not communicate, converse or glance at one another, as they sit lost in their separate, sombre thoughts.
"Vaughan was working well within a tradition when he painted The Bar; British artists from Hogarth to Burra had depicted figures in ale houses in an attempt to convey something of the human condition and the follies of the soul."
Vaughan (1912-1977) was a self-taught painter who went on to teach at the Camberwell College of Art and the Slade in London.
He was a regular in the Soho nightspots frequented by Francis Bacon.
His auction record stands at £313,250 ($501,168) for Theseus and the Minotaur, which sold in 2009.
Ivon Hitchens' Wooded Hollow made £68,500 ($106,935).
The fauvist-inspired work was executed in 1964.
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