An auctionner conducting sales at Sotheby's in Paris

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Sotheby's France saw a 30 percent increase in art sales in 2008 despite the financial crisis, becoming the leading auction house on the Paris marketplace, but Christie's slumped 19.1 percent, both firms said Friday.

Sotheby's overtook Christie's for the first time with 155.2 million euros (219 million dollars) in sales against its rival's 150.3 million (212 million dollars) in sales.

Smaller French auction house Artcurial registered a 25 percent drop to 93.7 million euros (132 million dollars).

Describing 2008 as "a very good year", the head of Sotheby's France Guillaume Cerutti said "we are nonetheless feeling the crisis and will feel it again in 2009."

Paris, he added, appeared to be doing better, however, than London or New York.

In early December, well into the crisis, Sotheby's France sold a drawing by Georges Seurat for five million euros (seven million dollars), the top sale of the year in France.

The auction house in 2008 also rang up 15 world records and made 18 sales worth more than 500,000 euros each (705,000 dollars).

Christie's France (Christie's International is owned by top French entrepreneur Francois Pinault), which over the past five years had been the country's leading auction house, registered a world record for furniture sold at auction with the four-million-euro (five million dollar) sale of an 18th century commode.

It made 18 sales worth over one million euros (1.4 million dollars).

"The wind has changed but it's not too bad given the current climate," the head of Christie's Europe, Francois Curiel, told AFP. "Prices will remain sound for rare objects."