Category: Discoveries
Exclusive - The Mona Lisa's mystery solved?
September 26 2011
Leonardo's Mona Lisa, begun in c.1503, has attracted more than its fair share of wild theories. Some say it is a portrait of Leonardo in drag, or more recently that it is the 'the depiction of a soul shared between an expectant mother and her unborn male child'. But now an intriguing new theory has been put forward by Donato Pezzutto, a Canadian doctor who is a keen amateur art historian. His theory is published in an article in Cartographica, a journal which publishes 'articles on all aspects of cartographic and geovisualization research'.
Here's the abstract from Pezzutto's article (quoted with kind permission): [More below]
The search for Leonardo's lost masterpiece
September 23 2011
Leonardo's greatest lost work is his Battle of Anghiari, painted in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence. Many scholars believe the painting survives, hidden beneath Giorgio Vasari's murals in the Hall of Five Hundred. Recently, it was discovered that behind Vasari's paintings is a gap, with a space 1 - 3cm deep before the main wall. Did Vasari deliberately create this gap to avoid painting over Leonardo's work? I've always thought it possible, given Vasari's interest in preservation.
Now, a group of experts is trying to use specialist scanning equipment to peer through Vasari's murals, in an attempt to solve the mystery. Fellow blogger Hasan Niyazi has posted an interview with one of the team behind the search, over at Three Pipe Problem.
No breasts please, we're Methodists
September 21 2011
From The Guardian:
A statue of a bare-breasted woman whose torso was discreetly covered for centuries has been found in a Bristol church house where John Wesley worshipped. There is speculation that the half-clad figure was considered too much of a distraction for Wesley, the founder of Methodism, and his followers. The figure, holding a cornucopia of fruit, is suspected to be Abundantia – a Roman personification of abundance and prosperity.
A reader writes:
Of course the article doesn't tell us what we really want to know - who is sable between three scallop shells argent a chevron of the second.
Quite. Any heralds out there?
New book on forger Van Meegeren published
September 16 2011
The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Holland has published a new book on the master forger Han Van Meegeren. In the 1930s and 40s he fooled leading museums and collectors (including Goering) into thinking his fakes were by Vermeer, and other Dutch Golden Age painters. Above is a little film by the museum on Van Meegeren, which is worth a click.
The book's final chapter describes how Van Meegeren managed to fool so many experts. But the thing is - he is still fooling experts. Some of you may remember that I recently helped uncover another Van Meegeren fake, in the Courtauld Institute. They, and others, believed it was in fact a genuine 17th Century work...
New work by Jean–Léon Gérôme discovered
September 6 2011
Picture: The Staedel Museum, Frankfurt. 'St Jerome and the Holy Aerobie' 1874 (detail).
The Staedel Museum in Frankfurt has found a lost work by Jean–Léon Gérôme, the French 19th Century artist. It was given to the museum in 1935, but was lost until rediscovered during renovation works. More details here.
Ford Madox Brown puzzle
September 6 2011
Picture: Manchester Art Gallery
I recently mentioned the new Ford Madox Brown exhibition at Manchester Art Gallery and the inclusion of the newly discovered Seraph's Watch. Julian Treuherz, who is curating the exhibition, has been in touch to see if anyone can help solve the apparent puzzle on the figure's shirt. He writes:
There is a puzzle in the painting, maybe some of your readers may be able to help. I cannot find out why Brown used the strange quincunx design on the seraph's tunic; he must have put it there for a reason, also the overlapping circles of the haloes and the little ones at the intersections of the haloes. Someone suggested Swedenborgian associations, but the Swedenborg Society looked into it for me but found nothing to confirm this.
Well, I'm stumped. But if anybody has any bright ideas, pray, let us know...
LA Police stumped by stolen 'Rembrandt'
September 2 2011
Police in Los Angeles are refusing to hand back a stolen 'Rembrandt' drawing - because they cannot determine whether it is by Rembrandt or not. 'The Judgment' was stolen from the Ritz-Carlton, but then found in a church two days later. More details here.
New works by Leonard Foujita
September 1 2011
Picture: Pola Museum of Art, Japan
A cache of newly discovered works by Leonard Foujita, the celebrated 20th Century Japanese artist, will go on display this month at the Pola Museum in Hakone, Japan. More here.
New works by Otto Dix found
August 31 2011
Picture: thelocal.de
Four new watercolours painted between 1922-3 have been found in Bavaria. Schön.
New Ford Madox Brown exhibition
August 12 2011
Picture: Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester Art Gallery will hold a new exhibition on Ford Madox Brown in September. It will be the first major exhibition of his work since 1964, and will assemble his greatest paintings, such as Work and The Last of England.
The show will also display this newly discovered work, The Seraph's Watch (A Reminiscence of the Old Master), found by the exhibition's curator, Julian Treuherz. Lost for many years, the composition was known only from a partial copy by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, which was sold recently at Sotheby's.
This picture is apparently Madox Brown's second version of the subject - the first, painted in 1846, is also lost. The fact that it is a replica may explain some of the rather awkward aspects of the newly discovered work. The drapery and drawing of the hands looks a little unusual.
The exhibition runs from 24th Sept 2011 - 29th Jan 2012. Full details here.
New British Art Journal
August 11 2011
Picture: Telegraph
Plop onto my desk comes the new British Art Journal, just in time to make it into my holiday reading bag. This looks to be an excellent issue, it even - gasp - has some new features. As ever, there's a zippy editorial from Robin Simon. He makes a plea for UK museums to make all their images free for use, as Yale has done. He is of course right, as I have said before.
Included in this issue are the following:
- Katherine Hudson on Edward Burra
- AP Duffy on Paul Nash
- Helen Wyld on Paul Sandby
- Alan Davidson on the artist and engraver Thomas Hardy
- Stephen Conrad on Gainsborough's first Self-portrait
- Thomas Tuoby on aspects of British art in Barodo, India
- Juliet McMaster on a possible new watercolour by Samuel Palmer
Is this by Turner?
August 1 2011
Picture: Museum of Wales
Off Margate was bought by the Museum of Wales in 1908 as a Turner. But since the 1950s its attribution has been questioned. Now, however, the Tate has pronounced that it is a genuine late work.
Beth McIntyre, curator at the Museum of Wales, told Wales Online:
“This painting was part of a large bequest to the museum in 1951 and shortly after it arrived, an expert questioned its authenticity. In those days, working out authorship wasn’t a question of science as it can be today, it was a question of ‘this doesn’t quite feel right’."
“This Turner – along with six others in the same bequest – is quite small and while it was identified as a Turner, the ‘late’ style was questioned at the time.”
Ms McIntyre felt the paintings should be seen by the Tate experts, and the decision paid off.
“We knew this painting had good historic provenance – we could trace its ownership back a long way,” she said. "However, Turner’s work was copied in his own lifetime so it was very difficult to be certain. So now we have confirmation from today’s experts that it is a Turner which is great news.”
Jewish Polish painting restituted
July 27 2011
Picture: Auktionshaus Aldag
Here's a rare survival: Jewish Woman Selling Oranges was painted in Warsaw in 1880/1 by the Polish artist Aleksander Gierymski. The picture belonged to the Polish National Museum, but went missing during the war. It surfaced last year at a German auction, and has now been restituted. Old Warsaw can be seen in the background.
'Leonardo' drawing case struck out
July 25 2011
The US Appeals court has thrown out a case against Christie's brought by the consignor of the above drawing. It was catalogued as 19th Century German School in a sale in 1998, but some scholars now say it is by Leonardo. Full details in the ATG here.
Young Tom?
July 20 2011
Picture: Keys Auctioneers
This curious drawing came up for auction last week in Norfolk. It was catalogued as 'attributed to Gainsborough'. It's a self-portrait, and relates to a larger painting of the 1750s in a private collection. It made a miserly £3,500.
If it is indeed by the young Tom, it is obviously worth a great deal more than that. Personally I thought it had an excellent chance of being 'right', and we had established some very compelling evidence to suggest that it was. But a well known Gainsborough author had already turned it down, so, sadly, for as long as that person holds sway it as good as worthless. It's an interesting example of the power of a single 'expert'. The drawing has been rather rubbed, so looks weaker than it once was.
The Bonnie Prince
July 14 2011
Picture: BG
Not a great discovery this, but you'll have to indulge my Jacobite obsession: here is Bonnie Prince Charlie (or King Charles III if you prefer), just arrived from France. There, it was thought to be a portrait of Louis XV. It is a decent copy in oil of La Tour's lost pastel of the Prince, which was painted in Paris in 1747, shortly after the failure of Charles' 1745 uprising.
It is my favourite portrait type of Charles. He seems, despite his crushing defeat, to be confident and regal, and one can see just how he deluded himself, for the rest of his life, into thinking that he would one day return as King.
I often see portraits of the Jacobites renamed as French kings and princes. It is ironic that even in his portraits Charles' royal claims were eventually ignored.
Salvator Mundi - National Gallery statement
July 13 2011
Picture: Robert Simon/Tim Nighswander
Here's the statement from the National Gallery on the Salvator Mundi:
The painting Salvator Mundi will be shown at The National Gallery, London, exhibition: Leonardo da Vinci: Painter of the Court of Milan from 9 November 2011 – 5 February 2012.
Leonardo is known to have painted the Salvator Mundi – an image of Christ holding a globe, with his right hand raised in blessing. The version in a private collection in New York was shown after cleaning to the Director of the National Gallery and to the Curator of the exhibition as well as to other scholars in the field. We felt that it would be of great interest to include this painting in the exhibition as a new discovery. It will be presented as the work of Leonardo, and this will obviously be an important opportunity to test this new attribution by direct comparison with works universally accepted as Leonardo’s. A separate press release on the Salvator Mundi is issued by the owner.
I can't immediately think of another major gallery that has included a newly discovered work found by a dealer in a blockbuster exhibition. It is a bold step by the National and its director, Nicholas Penny. Museums in some other countries, such as France, would probably recoil in horror. Personally, I cannot applaud the National enough for including the picture in the exhibition. It is a fitting recognition of the role that we dealers, and their discoveries, can play in advancing art history.
Jonathan Jones in the Guardian has, typically, the best piece on the story here.
A lost Michelangelo in Oxford?
July 13 2011
Picture: Campion Hall, Oxford
This picture belongs to Campion Hall, part of Oxford University. It has long been attributed to Marcello Venusti, a contemporary of Michelangelo. Now, however, an Italian art historian has said it is by Michelangelo himself. Mindful of the potential increase in value from £200,000 to many millions, Campion Hall will now send it to the Ashmolean Museum for safekeeping.
The art historian who has re-attributed the work has a track record of finding lost Michelangelos. He is Antonio Forcellino, perhaps best known for the '$300m Brooklyn Michelangelo' discovery in October 2010. That picture had also previously been associated with Venusti. Forcellino's findings on the Brooklyn picture were published in his book, 'La Pieta Perduta', in which it seemed to me that the picture was of such poor quality it could never have been painted by Michelangelo.
It is difficult to judge the Oxford case from the photos available, but I wouldn't be surprised if Forcellino's fellow scholars disagree with the latest attribution.
"convincingly re-attributed"
July 11 2011
Picture: V&A
Self-congratulatory post alert: the V&A have agreed with me that their Portrait of an Unknown Woman and Child formerly attributed to Joseph Highmore is in fact by Andrea Soldi. I first made the suggestion here a few weeks ago. The V&A have even been kind enough to give me a generous credit on their online catalogue:
Formerly attributed to Joseph Highmore (1692-1780), in 2011 the painting was convincingly re-attributed by Bendor Grosvenor (see History 2, curator's comments) to Andrea Soldi (ca. 1703-71), a Florentine painter who arrived in London in 1736.
Read the full argument here. It's great that the V&A put full historiographical information on their website, and are happy to have discussions over attributions. It's also (sorry, I can't resist this) quite a contrast with the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, who, despite eventually heeding my suggestion that they had the wrong Prince, only ever spoke to me to say I was wrong...
First image of newly found Leonardo
July 9 2011
Picture: Robert Simon/Tim Nighswander
Here's the first post-conservation photo of Salvator Mundi, the newly discovered Leonardo painting. Lost for centuries, it was bought in the US in the mid-2000s by the art dealer Alex Parish.
The picture will be included in the National Gallery's new Leonardo exhibition. But after speculation over the $200m asking price, which would conflict with the National's strict rules on loaned paintings, the owners have said the picture is now not for sale.
It's difficult to judge from the photo, but I can see no reason why it shouldn't be by Leonardo, as the scholars now say. The hand in particular seems very Leonardo like. The only question I suppose is the condition, given the thinness in the face. I can't wait to see it. What an incredible discovery by Alex Parish.
