Artist Tracey Emin’s controversial creation My Bed has shattered the record for one of her artworks at auction selling for STG2.54 million ($A4.64 million).

The 1999 Turner prize nomination, which features an unmade bed and a littered floor including empty vodka bottles, cigarette butts and discarded condoms, quadrupled the previous highest amount paid for a piece by the 50-year-old artist when it was sold at Christie’s in central London.

A senior member of the auction house hinted it could end up on public display after being snapped up by an anonymous bidder.

“We can’t announce it but I think it is going to end up somewhere important so watch this space for an announcement,” said Francis Outred, head of post-war contemporary art at Christie’s.

Emin was said to be delighted at the sale of one of the key works of the 1990s Young British Artist (YBA) movement.

Emin’s work was one of four pieces which achieved a world record at the auction, whose 75 lots sold for a total of STG99.4 million ($A181.44 million).

It included several pieces by Andy Warhol and Calcium Gluconate Injection by Damien Hirst, which fetched a hammer price of STG450,000. ($A821,392.72)