A Glasgow businessman yesterday broke the record for the price of a Peter Howson work after buying a painting for more than £100,000 at an auction in London.

After a tense and competitive sale at Sotheby's, the Scottish multi-millionaire collector, who made his fortune when his business was sold several years ago, snapped up The Temptation of St Antony for an official figure of £102,000.

The price of the painting exceeds the previous record price of $186,000 (£93,000) for a Howson called Sisters of Mercy, sold in New York in 2005.

With final auction charges, the actual price paid for the transaction was £102,000, although the "hammer price" for the picture was £85,000. Now the collector will add the painting, a typically figurative and colourful oil on canvass created in 1998 and estimated by auctioneers to reach between £60,000 and £80,000 before yesterday's sale, to his private gallery of more than 180 Howson originals.

The businessman, who spoke to The Herald under condition of his anonymity, said his collection of Howson paintings was partly inspired by the money he believes he is likely to make on their resale value in a few years' time.

He said Howson, who lives and works in Glasgow, has been reducing his prodigious output in recent years, which will increase the value of his work. The collector, aged 38 and a millionaire "a few times over", said: "Collecting art started as a hobby, but I also think that in five or six months you will see Howsons selling for £700,000 or more.

"I think this painting is a very good example of his work and my opinion is that he is one of the most talented painters alive. His most recent stuff, such as the painting of St Andrew he recently completed, is of a very high standard.

"There are about 20 to 25 of his paintings in my own collection which I would say are of very high quality. He is trying to reduce his output to only eight or 10 really good paintings a year and so the prices will only go up."

He added: "It feels great to own it, I thought the cost might go as far as £130,000. The competition really hotted up, my guy in the auction room was up against a gallery so bidding for it was pretty aggressive. I genuinely think that in a year or two a Howson original will go for £1m."

The artist was unavailable for comment last night.

Howson, who rose to prominence among the New Glasgow Boys group of artists in the 1980s, has moved into strongly-religious work in the last few years, after for many years being known for his depictions of tough and grotesque men. Religion has loomed large in his work since he reaffirmed his Christian belief after a stay at Castle Craig clinic, near Peebles, which he entered in 2000 to deal with drink and other problems.

His faith has been bolstered by various trips to Israel, where he has visited Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Galilee. Last year he unveiled a series of paintings inspired by the legend of St Andrew for Andrew: Portrait of a Saint, a major show staged at the City Arts Centre in Edinburgh.

Yesterday's sale was at Sotheby's Contemporary Art Day, and in the afternoon a picture by Andy Warhol that had been missing for 27 years was sold for £1.25m.

The 30 Coloured Maos (Reversal Series) silkscreen was stolen in 1980 while on exhibition in Paris, and its whereabouts remained unknown for almost three decades.

The acrylic silkscreen and ink on canvas picture was recovered earlier this year by the Art Loss Register after it was brought into Sotheby's in London for valuation in November 2006.

The specialist contacted the Register, the world's largest private international database of lost and stolen art, which tracked the history of the missing picture.