Ignored dusty painting hidden behind a door turns out to be a Brueghel 'masterpiece'

Record ID: 1717417

  • Title: Ignored dusty painting hidden behind a door turns out to be a Brueghel 'masterpiece'
  • Date: 27th March 2023
  • Summary: PARIS, FRANCE (MARCH 27, 2023) (REUTERS) PERSON LOOKING AT RARE PAINTING BY THE 17TH-CENTURY ARTIST PIETER BRUEGHEL THE YOUNGER VARIOUS OF PAINTING / PEOPLE LOOKING AT PAINTING VARIOUS OF AUCTIONEER MALO DE LUSSAC LOOKING AT PAINTING (SOUNDBITE) (English) AUCTIONEER MALO DE LUSSAC SAYING: "I found this painting in a French house and the painting was behind the door in the television room and I started my estimations in this room and when I turned back I saw this painting. So it was a very good surprise for me." VARIOUS OF PEOPLE LOOKING AT PAINTING (SOUNDBITE) (French) AUCTIONEER MALO DE LUSSAC SAYING: "I think that the oral tradition has in fact completely changed their perception of the painting and so they no longer believed in it, no longer believed (it was real) at all. And that's what's incredible, is that today this work, which surely must have been bought as an authentic one, has completely lost its authenticity with the family and in fact, we are giving them back this authenticity, by saying 'in fact your artwork is real', so I think it was simply verbally distorted over the years, and here we are today, with the Brueghel in Drouot (auction house), and that this painting is authentic." VARIOUS OF PEOPLE TAKING PHOTOS OF PAINTING ESTIMATED PRICE OF PAINTING (SOUNDBITE) (English) AUCTIONEER MALO DE LUSSAC SAYING: "Why such a high estimation? Because it's a masterpiece, we don't have anything else (like it). The big Brueghels around the world, the technique was very qualitative... (it) needs this estimate because it's completely unique." VARIOUS OF PEOPLE LOOKING AT PAINTING (SOUNDBITE) (French) AUCTIONEER MALO DE LUSSAC SAYING: "It's a real lesson actually for us, and it is that you can't always trust what you are being told, and to always finish the job and do it thoroughly, otherwise we'll never have this kind of surprises in our job, this is one of the biggest surprises I've had in my career." VARIOUS OF OTHER PIECES ON AUCTION VARIOUS OF PEOPLE TAKING PHOTOS OF PAINTING PAINTING/ SIGN READING (English/French): "AUCTION TUESDAY AT 2:30PM"
  • Embargoed: 10th April 2023 14:46
  • Keywords: Breughel copy
  • Location: PARIS, FRANCE
  • City: PARIS, FRANCE
  • Country: France
  • Topics: Art,Arts/Culture/Entertainment,Europe
  • Reuters ID: LVA001058227032023RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: A rediscovered painting of Flemish 17th-century painter Pieter Brueghel the Younger, for years regarded as a fake and hidden in a family house, is set to be sold at an auction on Tuesday (March 27) and is expected to be sold for about 800,000 euros.    
    The painting L'Avocat du village (the Village Lawyer) is one of Brueghel's largest known works, measuring 112cm high and a 184cm wide, and was unknown in the art world, having been kept in the same family since the 1900s with its most recent generation thinking the artwork was fake.
    The family, who wishes to remain unknown, had asked Malo de Lussac of auctioneers Daguerre Val de Loire to make an estimation of their house but instead gained a masterpiece.
    "I found this painting [in the house], behind a door in the television room," de Lussac told Reuters, calling it one of the biggest surprises in his career.
    "And that's what's incredible," he said. "We are giving them back this authenticity by saying 'in fact your artwork is real'".
    Brueghel the Younger, whose father Brueghel the Elder died when he was only five, didn't use one of his father's compositions for this painting as he usually did.
    Art experts estimated that the artwork was painted between 1615 and 1617.
    (Production: Yiming Woo)
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2023. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
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