A few years ago I had a pleasure to participate in a British project called National Inventory of Continental European Paintings: I have researched and made catalogue entries for 231 paintings in the collection of York Art Gallery, dating back from 15th century to ca. 1900. Obviously those earliest pictures…
“The Last da Vinci” – that is how Christie’s advertised the painting of Christ Salvator Mundi, sold on November 2017 and eventually placed in the collection of Abu Dhabi Louvre. Indeed, there are not many art-pieces that can be ascribed to Leonardo himself, but there is always a chance that…
In November 2017 Christie’s in New York made a sale which has been a world record, selling a painting Christ Salvator Mundi (that is: Saviour of the World) for over 450 million dollars (!). The artwork went to Abu Dhabi and ended up in the Abu Dhabi Louvre museum. On…
The Laocoön Group is one of the most famous ancient sculptures, depicting mythical Laocoön and his sons being killed by the snakes. The statue was discovered in Rome in 1506 – it was unearthed in the vineyard of certain Felice De Fredis. Immediately Giuliano da Sangallo was called to the site…
Imagine this: you are living in an old house and one day your roof starts to leak. You have to fix it – so you go to the attic and look for the leak. Instead, you find an old painting; and it turns out that it may be a lost…