Magistrate of Brussels is an unfinished oil painting or oil sketch by Anthony van Dyck, rediscovered in 2013 after being shown on episodes of the BBC television programme Antiques Roadshow.
| Magistrate of Brussels | |
|---|---|
 The restored painting | |
| Artist | Anthony van Dyck |
| Year | Circa 1634 |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Owner | Father Jamie MacLeod |
The work was purchased for £400 from a Nantwich, Cheshire, antiques shop some years previously by Father Jamie MacLeod and hung in the Whaley Hall Ecumenical Retreat House, which he runs, at Whaley Bridge.[1] At one point, it fell from the wall there, smashing a CD player, but sustained no significant damage. The frame was labelled "Sir A van Dyck", but the picture was thought to be a copy.[1] He took the painting to a recording of Antiques Roadshow at Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire, in 2012.[relevant?][1][2]
MacLeod then took it to a second recording, at the Royal Agricultural University, Cirencester.[3] There, it was recognised as potentially a van Dyck by presenter Fiona Bruce,[1][4] who had been working with art historian Philip Mould on an episode of another BBC programme (Fake or Fortune?), which recently featured works by van Dyck.[5] Mould shared her suspicions and suggested that the work be treated by an expert restorer, in what he described as "the art equivalent of an [archaeological] excavation".[1] The painting was restored by Simon Gillespie, who used solvent to remove layers of overpainting, in a process that took the equivalent of three weeks of full-time work.[1] The removal of later painting returned what had appeared to be a finished portrait into a sketch with unfinished details. The ruff in particular was shown only in outline.[1] The work was then confirmed as van Dyck's by Christopher Brown, a noted authority on the painter.[1]
Mould thought that the painting was probably a preparatory sketch for Van Dyck's 1634 work Magistrates of Brussels, which was destroyed in the Bombardment of Brussels in 1695.[6] Its composition is known from a grisaille sketch, in the Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris,[7] which van Dyck prepared to show how he planned to lay out the piece.[1] Another three sketches of magistrates' heads for the same work, with the same red background as MacLeod's painting,[1] are known to exist: two in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, and a third which was sold to an unknown buyer.[8] A further work, in the Royal Collection, may also be from the same series.[8] Mould pointed out that the pose of the MacLeod portrait matched that of the rightmost individual in the grisaille sketch.[1]
Mould valued the sketch at between £300,000 and £400,000,[1] making it the most valuable painting identified in the 36-year history of the programme.[2] MacLeod announced his intention to sell it and to use the money to buy church bells, in commemoration of the centenary of the start of the First World War.[1] In May 2014, it was announced that the work would be auctioned at Christie's on 8 July.[9] Still, it failed to sell on that occasion.[10] It was later sold to a private collector.[11] In 2015, the painting was on loan to the Rubenshuis, and in 2016 it was exhibited at the Frick Collection in New York.[12] As of September 2018, it remained a part of the Rubenshuis exhibition.[11]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Antiques Roadshow Retrospective". Antiques Roadshow. Series 36. Episode 11. 29 December 2013. BBC. Retrieved 29 December 2013.
- ^ a b "Antiques Roadshow portrait revealed to be by Anthony Van Dyck". BBC Online. 29 December 2013. Retrieved 29 December 2013.
- ^ "Antiques Roadshow Cirencester 1". Antiques Roadshow. Series 36. Episode 7. 3 December 2013. BBC. Retrieved 29 December 2013.
- ^ "Fiona Bruce's Antiques Roadshow 'hunch' leads to discovery of lost". The Independent. 29 December 2013. Retrieved 22 August 2023.
- ^ "Van Dyck: What Lies Beneath". Fake or Fortune?. Series 2. Episode 3. 30 September 2012. BBC. Retrieved 5 October 2012.
- ^ Withnall, Adam (29 December 2013). "Fiona Bruce's Antiques Roadshow 'hunch' leads to discovery of lost £400,000 Van Dyck masterpiece". The Independent. Retrieved 29 December 2013.
- ^ "A new Van Dyck discovery at the Royal Collection – Art History News – by Bendor Grosvenor". Art History news. 15 May 2013. Retrieved 29 December 2013.
- ^ a b Grosvenor, Bendor. "A Study for the Head of a Magistrate of Brussels". Artnet. Retrieved 29 December 2013.
- ^ "Antiques Roadshow Van Dyck To Go Under The Hammer At Christie's". Artlyst. 30 May 2014. Retrieved 30 May 2014.
- ^ "Antiques Roadshow Van Dyck painting fails to sell at auction". BBC News. 9 July 2014. Retrieved 16 November 2014.
- ^ a b "Anthony van Dyck | Rubenshuis".
- ^ "Sketch of a Brussels Magistrate by Anthony van Dyck on long term loan to the Rubenshuis". 17 November 2015.