Vincent Van Gogh’s L’Arlesienne, Madame Ginoux. (AFP)

New York, May 3 (Reuters): A van Gogh portrait of a French cafe owner sold for more than $40 million at the season’s first major Impressionist and modern art sale yesterday.

Led by the 1890 van Gogh work, L’Arlesienne, Madame Ginoux, which went for $40.3 million, Christie’s took in $180.2 million including commissions. It was the fourth-highest price obtained for a van Gogh painting at auction, Christie’s said.

That was the auction house’s highest total since May 1990, when a market driven largely by speculation at the hands of Japanese buyers gave way to the crash of the early 1990s.

Sluggish economic conditions did not deter bidders from paying $34.7 million for Picasso’s 1932 work The Rest. The vibrant, large-scale depiction of the artist’s wife, Olga, was estimated to fetch $15 million to $20 million, but a bidding war erupted.

Auctioneer Christopher Burge said the sale reflected “right across the board a solid, strong market, without being a crazy market.” The prices, he added, were “not in any way out of control.”