Pollock's nickname was "Jack the Dripper".

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Unnamed art experts said that US media magnate David Geffen had sold the 4ft by 8ft work, No 5, 1948, to Mexican financier David Martinez.

The reported price exceeds the $135m (£71m) paid in June for a 1907 portrait by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt.

The Pollock work features the US artist's famous drip-and-pour style.

The deal is said to have been brokered by Sotheby's auctioneer Tobias Meyer.

Jackson Pollock's work had a major influence on art in the latter half of the 20th Century, sparking the emergence of abstract expressionism.

But the artist battled alcoholism and depression and is generally regarded as a self-destructive, tortured genius. He died in a car crash in 1956, aged 44.