Botticelli: Hidden image discovered under $ 40 million work

Before Sotheby’s auction
Experts uncover hidden image beneath $ 40 million Botticelli paintings

Portraits of Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510) are extremely rare at auctions. In any case, only around a dozen of these works by the Italian painter and draftsman of the early Renaissance exist. Last January, the painting “Young Man Holding a Roundel” went under the hammer online at Sotheby’s in New York. At that time, the picture changed hands for 80 million dollars (about 70 million euros). With fees, the total price was even $ 92.2 million. Sotheby’s announced at the time that so much had never been paid for a work by the Italian painter at auction.

This record sale apparently inspired another collector to part with his Botticelli painting. “The Man of Sorrows” is due to be auctioned at Sotheby’s on January 27th. The image of Christ, which the Florentine painted at the end of his career, when he was heavily influenced by the Dominican church reformer Girolamo Savonarola and Christian symbolism and spirituality shaped his style, is said to bring in at least 40 million US dollars.

Botticelli apparently wanted to save material

But the painting not only shows Christ tormented by the pain of the crucifixion, it also hides another image beneath its surface, such as the specialist newspaper “The Art Newspaper” reported. During the technical analysis that Sotheby’s carried out in the run-up to the auction, a fascinating depiction of a Madonna and Child was discovered under the layers of paint.

In his view, it is a “Madonna of Tenderness” (a type derived from Greek icons) who nestles the head of the Christ child closely against one’s own cheek, explained Chris Apostle, head of the Old Master Paintings department at Sotheby’s in New York , the newspaper. Apostle therefore had the opportunity to examine the picture in detail. The facial features, especially the nose, eyes and laughing mouth, which he identified as those of the Christ child, can be seen on an infrared image when the image is turned upside down.

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The head occupies a place under the chest of the Man of Sorrows, while an eye and an eyebrow, which apparently belonged to a female head, are visible in the area near Christ’s right hand, Apostle reported. In the lower part of the figure, a white underpainting can also be seen, which may consist of cadmium. Other visible parts would look like folds of a coat, with decorative ribbons around the shoulder and part of a sleeve. And the child’s chubby arm can also be seen.

Some lines in the hidden drawing are thicker than others, suggesting they may have been traced from a standard draft and then overworked with a liquid pigment, Apostle said. But the head of the baby Jesus is “unique”: there is nowhere a replica of it.

Such an overpainted drawing is not, however, extremely unusual. Apostle explained that he had come across something like this several times. “In the Renaissance, tables were a valuable commodity,” says the expert, and if it was an unfinished work of art – in this case a Madonna and Child, a motif that Botticelli and his hard-working studio regularly produced – “then you wanted it do not throw away.” And so Botticelli simply turned the table over and used it for an extraordinary new work.

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