An awe-inspiring view of Switzerland's Rigi Mountain by JMW Turner has set a British record for a watercolour painting.

The 1842 masterpiece, called The Blue Rigi: Lake of Lucerne, Sunrise, was sold to an anonymous telephone bidder for £5.8m ($11.99m) in London on Monday.

It had been expected to fetch about £2m when it was offered for sale at Christie's.

The auction house descried the painting as "the most important watercolour to appear at auction for over 50 years and one of the most impressive ever painted by the artist".

The previous record for a watercolour on paper by Turner was set in 2001 when Heidelberg with a Rainbow sold for £2.04m.

Noël Annesley, honorary chairman of Christie's, said: "This exceptional watercolour marks the culmination of Turner’s achievement in the medium that he made his own, and its appearance at auction offers a special opportunity for both museums and private collectors.

"In a technique of almost unimaginable subtlety Turner expresses his lifelong preoccupation with the effects of light, shade and atmosphere."

The previous best for a British watercolour on paper was the £2.64m paid for Dante Gabriel Rossetti's Pandora in 2000.

The record for a Turner painting is £20.4m for Giudecca, La Donna della Salute and San Giorgio, set in April of this year.

Turner is widely recognized as one of the greatest and most original landscape painters in history.

He was born in Covent Garden in 1775 and died in Chelsea in 1851 at the age of 76.