A man looks at 'Portrait of Clara Serena Rubens', 1616, by Peter Paul Rubens at 'Rubens. Painter of sketches' exhibition in Madrid, Spain. This is not the Rubens Christie's is selling. Photo / Getty
A man looks at 'Portrait of Clara Serena Rubens', 1616, by Peter Paul Rubens at 'Rubens. Painter of sketches' exhibition in Madrid, Spain. This is not the Rubens Christie's is selling. Photo / Getty
When New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art decided to sell off a portrait of Rubens' daughter, Clara Serena, they were convinced it was the work of a mere "follower" of the Old Master.
So, in 2013, the painting was given the modest auction estimate of between £14,500 to £22,000 ($28,000 to $43,000). But, a British collector who bought it for £457,500 ($889,000) appeared to know something the Met's scholars did not.
Now the painting has been accepted as a Rubens original, exhibiting a uniquely intimate and spontaneous style, and is going up for auction at Christie's in July with an estimate of between £3 million and £5 million.
The family portrait of Clara Serena, Sir Peter Paul Rubens' only daughter, was painted around 1623 about the time she died from the plague, aged just 12.
In the 1940's the art historian Julius Held declared that it was not a Rubens original and so the painting fell out of favour. In 2013 it was sold off to pay for new acquisitions at the world famous American museum.
Portrait of Clara Serena, for sale by Christie's, was written off by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York as teh work of a Rubens' follower. Photo / Christie's
"There's always a flicker of excitement when you see a picture is being sold by a major museum," said Bendor Grosvenor, an art historian, collector and BBC presenter. "There's no doubt in my mind that it's a Rubens. The piece is painted clearly in his idiosyncratic style. It's a beautiful depiction of his daughter."
Grosvenor believes a costly mistake was made by staff at the Met. The then buyer, who is anonymous but is believed to live in London, had experts clean off layers of dirt and green overpainting. Now, scholars are convinced it was by Rubens. Unlike his famous and more extravagant works commissioned by wealthy patrons, it is thought this portrait painting was not intended for public view.
Henry Pettifer, head of Old Master Painting at Christie's London, said that since its restoration it has been shown as a Rubens original three times in public, including at Rubenhuis, the Antwerp museum and studio of the Flemish Old Master, and at the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh.
"Through a process of restoration and the removal of layers of dirty varnish and overpainting people became convinced that it was a Rubens," he said.
"The picture is unusual in its highly personal and highly intimate character. It speaks of a bolder and freer character compared to his formal commissions for his wealthy clients."
Grosvenor added: "The Met should question their judgement about that sale, but I suspect they will be a little defensive about it today," Grosvenor continued. "It was odd that they decided to sell it based on a judgement made decades earlier.
"Julius Held may not have been aware it was overpainted. But, in art history, people writing a book, which Held was doing at the time, seem to be granted a godlike status. It can then become difficult to shift that consensus.
"Really, the Met should have rung up other Rubens scholars to see what they thought. Then, they should have looked into the overpainting on the girl's dress. It looks like they did neither."
A spokeswoman for the Met said they stood by their decision to sell the painting in 2013 as part of the deaccession of art works removed from their collection to fund new purchases.
"The attribution of the picture has been debated in the past and we believe it will continue to be debated," she said. "Given the strength of our holdings in this area, we stand by the decision to deaccession the work."
In 2016, Rubens 'The Lot and his Daughters' sold for £44.8 million at Christie's, a record for an Old Master work, beaten the following year by Leonardo da Vinci's 'Salvator Mundi'.
It is anticipated that Clara Serena will generate international interest of art collectors.
The identification of this portrait stems from her likeness to Rubens's drawing of her mother at the British Museum, as well as a painting of Clara Serena at a younger age, which is held at the Liechtenstein Collection.
