LONDON - Three sketches by Spanish artist Goya presumed lost for 130 years sold at auction for about $8 million Tuesday, kicking off a series of old masters art auctions in London.

Christie's said the sketches were last recorded at an auction in Paris in 1877 and were presumed lost until a private Swiss collector contacted the auction house with suspicions that the sketches were done by Francisco Jose de Goya y Lucientes.

The top-selling sketch, "Bajar rinendo," or "They go down quarrelling," sold for about $4.6 million) - twice its estimated price. It depicts four women fighting as they fall through the air, with one woman yanking another's hair.

The other two sketches depict a constable stitched inside a dead horse and a wide-eyed man praying in front of a cross.

All of the prices included the buyer's premium.

The sketches come from the private notebooks of Goya, who worked in the Spanish courtly tradition, but is also known for the fantastic, dark and often disturbing works he painted later in his career. During the last three decades of his life, the Spanish artist used the notebooks to draw people in various moods and situations.

A recently discovered painting by Jean-Antoine Watteau also sold at Christie's for about $24.4 million, the highest price ever paid for a French Old Master painting at auction. The painting called "La Surprise" had been missing for almost 200 years and was found in a British country house last year.

Previous art auctions by Christie's and rival Sotheby's have shown the art market remains strong despite the global economic downturn.

A Monet water lily painting sold for more than $80 million in June, setting a record for the most expensive work of art ever sold by Christie's in Europe. Sotheby's sold a portrait by Francis Bacon for about $27 million during its contemporary art week. Both works sold for well over their estimated values.

The two auction houses will continue their old masters sales this week.

On Tuesday night, Christie's will auction another rediscovered work, this one by Jean-Antoine Watteau, that is expected to fetch $6 million to $10 million. On Wednesday, Sotheby's will auction an oil painting portrait by Dutch artist Frans Hals that is valued at about $6 million to $10 million.

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