Every day, for decades, the old woman walked the same path. He crossed the living room and followed the hallway to the kitchen of his house in Compiègne, a town in northern France. I didn't know those steps cost 24.1 million euros. The secret? A nondescript icon-like panel measuring 20 × 20 centimeters was hung near the pots. That work was painted in tempera Christ mocked, of Simabu (1272-1302). It marks the transition from icon to painting. Its history…
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limitations
Every day, for decades, the old woman walked the same path. He crossed the living room and followed the hallway to the kitchen of his house in Compiègne, a town in northern France. I didn't know those steps cost 24.1 million euros. The secret? A nondescript icon-like panel measuring 20 × 20 centimeters was hung near the pots. That work was painted in tempera Christ mocked, of Simabu (1272-1302). It marks the transition from icon to painting. Art history. An extremely rare piece by a Florentine author from a group of which only two works are known in the world. Distributed between the Frick Collection (New York) and the National Gallery (London). The French government has declared the tablet a national treasure and it is now part of the Louvre. It was invented by a businessman named Eric Durbin. He famously discovered a canvas in a French loft in 2014 (Judith and Holofernes) Attributed to Caravaggio—with great doubts. After all, it was bought by the American hedge fund manager and billionaire Damilson Hill (the price was never disclosed, although there was talk of $30 million).
Dusk descends on this era of sleepers: pieces misallocated or unspecified. They're called sleepers in art jargon, and they've been an essential source of income for a $1 billion-a-year market whose value has fallen 37% since 2013. Jordi Cole – Responsible Here is the man Caravaggio, appearing at the Madrid auction, stopped short of raising them. “Competition with new technologies seems never-ending; It's not worth it. The future is private sales,” he reflects. There are now countless programs on smartphones that alert you to attributes, current prices, or similar canvases. Technology is changing appearances. Collectors know the gallerist's “real” purchase costs. It's like playing poker with the cards face up. “The Internet allows everyone to find sleepers,” Eric Durbin ventures. It's hard for great creations to go unnoticed with new apps. On the contrary. As the pace of acquiring pieces increases, so does the competition between dealers and collectors. “Of course, those sleepers are curious, more or less important, dictated by fashion and often capable of raising a shout based on promotional purposes. Those who do not fall into this category may continue to sleep until the next change of taste,” criticizes Professor Giuseppe Porcio of the University of Naples.
Competition has never been so strong nor has the search been so easy. “It is impossible to deny it: more and more competitors appear. But there are sleepers, there is no money to buy them,” says gallery owner Nicolas Cortes. He still believes in ignorance. Pure paradox. “Neither the auction houses nor the experts know much,” he defends. Perhaps he is Zurbarán. , might find oil paintings by Maíno, Ribera, Goya, Artemisia Gentileschi, Orazio Gentileschi or Caracciolo. It is impossible to excel in a profession without effort, he observes. “I don't use search tools or apps to find them. savior of the world”, Robert Simon, one of the inventors (along with Alexander Parrish) of the table attributed today to Leonardo da Vinci reveals. “What matters is the knowledge and visual memory needed to recognize an artist's style in an unknown work.” There is a battle between the old job of intuition and the new job of lighting up the screen.
