A nude photo of the new French First Lady Carla Bruni was unveiled Friday at Christie's auction house in New York.

As part of Christie's photography sale, Bruni's picture belongs to a larger collection of photographs from Gert Elfering, which all will go under the hammer on April 10th in New York.

Philippe Garner, Christie's International Head of Photographs Dept, compared Bruni's artistic black and white image to other iconic pictures.

"The Carla Bruni study was one that seemed a natural for us. In the catalogue you'll see we compared the pose to the famous Sera nude which is in the Museum D'Orsay. It's a contemporary twist on a very classic subject."

When the sale was planned last year, the discreet Bruni photo had been estimated to fetch a mere 3-thousand to 4-thousand US dollars, but with her marriage to Sarkozy and recent media hype, the final price is expected to be much higher.

Other famous photographs in the Elfering collection include a black and white portrait of Bridget Bardot taken by Richard Avedon in 1959 and the "Tied-Up Torso, Ramatuelle" by Helmut Newton from 1980.

Total sales from this collection are initially estimated to be between 2 to 3 million US dollars.