From the BBC:
29 December 2013 Last updated at 09:57 GMT
Antiques Roadshow portrait revealed to be by Anthony Van Dyck
A painting bought for £400 and featured on the BBC’s Antiques Roadshow has been revealed to be a Sir Anthony Van Dyck portrait worth about £400,000.
Father Jamie MacLeod, who runs a retreat house in north Derbyshire, first took the artwork to Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire, in 2012.
He said he was now planning to sell the piece by the 17th century Flemish artist to buy new church bells.
The BBC show’s host Fiona Bruce said she was “thrilled” by the revelation.
More was revealed about the painting when Father Jamie took it to filming for another edition of Antiques Roadshow in Cirencester, Gloucestershire in June this year.
The Van Dyck portrait was identified after Ms Bruce, who was making a show about the artist with expert Philip Mould, saw the painting and thought it might be genuine.
Following restoration, the painting was verified by Dr Christopher Brown – one of the world authorities on Van Dyck.
The portrait, originally bought at a Cheshire antiques shop, is the most valuable painting identified in the show’s 36-year history.
Father Jamie, who runs a retreat house in Whaley Bridge, in the Peak District, said: “It’s been an emotional experience and it’s such great news.”
Van Dyck was the leading court painter in England under King Charles I and is regarded as one of the masters of 17th Century art.
The painting is a portrait of a Magistrate of Brussels which is believed to have been completed as part of the artist’s preparation for a 1634 work showing seven magistrates.
Ms Bruce said: “It’s everyone’s dream to spot a hidden masterpiece, I’m thrilled that my hunch paid off, to discover a genuine Van Dyck is incredibly exciting. I’m so pleased for Father Jamie.”
Mr Mould said: “Discoveries of this type are exceptionally rare.
“The painting’s emergence from beneath layers of paint was dramatic. It’s been revealed as a thrilling example of Van Dyck’s skills of direct observation that made him so great a portrait painter.”
A Van Dyck self-portrait that was recently sold to a collector who wants to take it abroad, has become subject to a temporary export ban.
The National Portrait Gallery is trying to raise £12.5m to keep it in the UK.
The portrait will be shown on Antiques Roadshow at 19:00 GMT on BBC One on Sunday.
See also here.
Related articles
- Antiques Roadshow discovers painting worth £400,000 (itv.com)
- Fiona Bruce’s £400,000 hunch: Antiques Roadshow star spots that £400 painting is really a Van Dyck worth a thousand times as much (dailymail.co.uk)
- Priest who paid £400 for Antiques Roadshow masterpiece portrait worth £400,000 nearly bought a bookcase instead (mirror.co.uk)
Wow! I guess it’s never too late to discover something valuable. Thanks for this post.
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My pleasure 🙂 Maybe there will be similar discoveries 🙂
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The Antiques Roadshow has been running for years. I wonder how many other such discoveries they made? Fantastic news for the priest. He`ll be able to get his bells and a belfry with that!
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The BBC say this is the most valuable painting ever of that show. They don’t mention non-paintings.
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The whiff of Tory Stunt money
There seems to be a bit of a decline in Cameron’s circle as well. F1 Boss Bernie Ecclestone’s son-in-law, James Stunt, has become the latest big-money donor to the Conservatives.
Stunt, a flashy billionaire dubbed one of the “vulgarati” by the Financial Times, gave £50,000 to the Conservatives on June 2, according to figures released recently by the Electoral Commission.
This entitles Stunt to membership of the Conservative Leaders Group who “are invited to join David Cameron and other senior figures from the Conservative Party at dinners” and other events. Stunt is more used to hanging out with Paris Hilton and Mel Gibson.
The money will be welcome, but Stunt’s support won’t help Cameron look like a man of the people.
The 28-year-old has a reported £5 billion fortune thanks to his marriage to Petra Ecclestone in Italy in 2011, where celebrations included personal performances by David Guetta and the Black Eyed Peas.
Stunt had a smaller personal fortune before the marriage thanks to involvement in the gambling business.
Stunt uses his money to indulge his love of supercars — this April he was spotted shopping in Chelsea in a convoy of cars — a Lamborghini, two Rolls Royces and a Range Rover — worth a million quid.
He also has a love of art — last year he applied for a license to export Van Dyck’s last self-portrait, a painting of world-historical importance — to the US, because he wanted to hang it in his private home in California.
The National Portrait Gallery raised £10 million from the public and the lottery to stop Stunt hogging the painting.
Along with his flashy habits, there is also the embarrassing issue of Stunt’s father-in-law recently paying £59 million to stop a bribery court case.
Still, as Emperor Vespasian said after he raised funds by taxing Roman toilets — money has no smell.
http://morningstaronline.co.uk/a-8a95-How-new-Labour-lost-Scotland#.VBMApRbvaes
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