Re-discovered Rembrandt Announced: The Financial Times revealed yesterday that a work auctioned at Christie’s as ‘circle of Rembrandt’ was bought be dealer Jan Six whose ancestor (also named Jan Six) was painted by Rembrandt. Six cleaned the work and authenticated it. During the sale, Six was bidding against Bendor Grosvenor offered some commentary, on his Art History News site, on spotting the work and hitting his limit:
- The painting was offered in London as ‘Circle of Rembrandt’, with an estimate of £15,000-£20,000, and ultimately made £137,000. For what it’s worth, I was one of the underbidders. Although I’m absolutely not a Rembrandt specialist, I thought on seeing the picture that it had an excellent chance of being by Rembrandt himself, painted in the early 1630s. The brilliantly painted collar in particular I thought was almost as good as a signature, and entirely consistent with the collar on the painting by Rembrandt of Philip Lucasz in the National Gallery, which was painted in 1635. What was interesting is that from the photos, the painting did not look that impressive. But in person, it was almost as one was looking at a different painting. That’s a common connoisseurial challenge these days of course; photos so rarely do justice to good paintings. …
Bendor Grosvenor Gives a Little Art History Lesson While Paying His Respects to Simon Schama: Getting over his disappointment over the Rembrandt, Grosvenor has a diary in The Art Newspaper talking about his recent trip to Venice to film a lesson in the Renaissance debate over ‘disegno’ against ‘colore.’ Shortly after returning, Grosvenor discovered Simon Schama had covered similar territory in his own Civilization series:
- I eventually settled on Titian’s Pesaro Madonna (1519-26) in the Frari church. Here, Titian used blocks of colour to help create a pioneering composition, with the Madonna placed daringly off-centre. Best of all, the picture is full of pentimenti, where Titian changed his mind as he painted. Over time, his earlier intentions have become visible through the paint layers (he even moved an enormous background column), and these changes, I argued, would help us show that Titian did not carefully draw out his compositions first, as dictated by the disciples of disegno, but explored his way across the canvas as the picture emerged before him. …
Alberto Mugrabi Would “Do Anything” to Have Basquiat’s Flexible: The New York Post hypes Jean-Michel Basquiat with a quote from Helly Nahmad whose family has a significant position in the artist. But the quote of the piece goes to Alberto Mugrabi also the scion of an art-holding family with quite a number of works by Basquiat. He’s commenting on Phillips’s painting from the Basquiat estate being sold without a guarantee:
- “‘Flexible’ is one of the greatest paintings I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Alberto Mugrabi, a Manhattan-based art dealer and a major collector of Basquiat — whose wrist is tattooed with Basquiat’s signature crown. “It is sublime. I think it will go for $50 or $60 million. If it goes for $150 [million], it is still worth it. God, I would do anything to have this painting.”
