Lost Rembrandt Painting Gets Recovered In Italy After Falling Off Wall
Image via Netherlands Institute for Art History / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)
A long-lost Rembrandt painting has been found in Italy, as local news agency ANSA first reported last week. The artwork, The Adoration of the Magi, depicts a nativity scene in which infant Jesus is visited by the three magi.
The piece was rediscovered in 2016 when a family in Rome sent the painting for restoration after it had fallen off the wall.
They had thought it to be a copy of the original, but restorer Antonella Di Francesco realized it could be the real deal. On June 22, the French Academy of the Villa Medici in Rome officially confirmed the painting as a Rembrandt original.
While the family hasn’t been identified, it is reported that they are intending to sell the work, which could go for an estimated US$83.5 million to US$238.5 million, as per ARTnews. However, the family also told CNN that they were planning to lease the painting to museums and galleries for public viewing.
The rediscovery of the work is indeed one of the career highlights for restorer Francesco, who responded, “During my work one of the most beautiful things that can happen during a lifetime: the sudden awareness of being in front of a work by a very great author who reveals himself to you, which comes out of its opaque zone and chooses you to be redeemed from the darkness.”
Although many of Rembrandt’s paintings have been lost to antiquity, there are pieces such as this that resurface to great interest. Previous rediscoveries include Head of a Bearded Man, a painting that was also thought to be a copy, but was reattributed to the artist in 2020.
Apart from rediscovering the artist’s works, museums have also been working to restore some of the works already on display. Last week, Rembrandt’s famed Night Watch painting was restored by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam to its original size.
Image via Netherlands Institute for Art History / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)
[via ARTnews, cover image via Netherlands Institute for Art History / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)]
Also check out these recent news
