Art Market Monitor

Global Coverage ~ Unique Analysis

  • AMMpro
  • AMM Fantasy Collecting Game
  • Podcast
  • Contact Us

Whoa, Bouguereau

February 25, 2009 by Marion Maneker

BouguereauThis bizarre story from New York Social Diary has also appeared in the New York Post and some local papers. It involves some nuns, some colluding art dealers and  a missing Bouguerueau that eventually sold for $5 million even though the convent only got $450,000:

In late 2004, the nuns decided to evaluate for possible sale, a deteriorating old oil painting they had in their chapel. The piece in question eventually turned out to be a lost masterpiece by William A. Bouguereau, Notre-Dame des Anges, which was last shown publicly in this country at the World’s Columbian Exhibition held in Chicago in 1893.

Not knowing what they had, they hired Mark Lasalle, an art dealer based in Albany, New York, to provide an appraisal of the painting declaring its auction value or fair market value. His initial appraisal of the painting was for $150,000 but he recommended that it be restored by the Williamstown Art Conservation Center of Williamstown, Mass.

This the nuns did and after several years, toward the end of the centers restoration work, Lassalle in brought experts from Sotheby’s in New York City, who valued it at an estimated $2.5 million at auction. After Zaplin flipped it for about $2.5 million, the painting ultimately sold through an art dealer in Dallas, Texas named Brian Roughton for reportedly over $5 million.

The whole scheme came to light because one of the dealers involved in the scam went to the convent and gave an affadavit, surely only motivated by remorse.

Seller Beware (New York Social Diary)

Con (vent) Artist (NY Post)

More from Art Market Monitor

  • Latin HeatLatin Heat
  • Pax AmericanaPax Americana
  • American MorningAmerican Morning
  • A Quick Look at New York’s Contemporary Evening SalesA Quick Look at New York’s Contemporary Evening Sales
  • Sotheby’s Brings $30m Pollock to New YorkSotheby’s Brings $30m Pollock to New York
  • Sotheby’s Has $25m 1932 Picasso ‘Le Repos’ for MaySotheby’s Has $25m 1932 Picasso ‘Le Repos’ for May

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: New York, Paintings

About Marion Maneker

Want to get Art Market Monitor‘s posts sent to you in our email? Sign up below by clicking on the Subscribe button.

Top Posts

  • Keith Haring’s 1989 Retrospect Comes to Sotheby’s London Prints Sale
  • British Modernists Draw Deep Bidding in Christie's $42 M. London Sales
  • Tony Podesta's Secret Art Buying
  • Four of Picasso's Women Valued at $28m Come to Christie's from Rose-Walters Collection
  • Norman Rockwell's Not Gay. But Is He a Great Artist?
  • $10 M. Picasso Portrait Unseen for Decades to Sell at Bonhams
  • How to Chant Like an Auctioneer
  • Roy Lichtenstein’s Top Ten Auction Prices
  • Christie’s to Sell Its First Fully Digital Work of Art in Test of Emerging Market
  • Phillips to Showcase Helen Frankenthaler at Southampton Outpost
  • About Us/ Contact
  • Podcast
  • AMMpro
  • Newsletter
  • FAQ

twitterfacebooksoundcloud
Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
California Privacy Rights
Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Advertise on Art Market Monitor