The oil painting was located some 20 kilometres from where it was originally exhibited in the 16th century.
This painting was found to be on display in one of the reception rooms at Shire Hall in Warwick, England. It appears in a photo that Tim Cox, Lord Lieutenant of Warwickshire, posted on July 4 on X, according to Artnet News. It was identified by Adam Busiakiewicz, an art historian working for Sotheby’s.
“Strange discoveries can happen at any moment, it appears. This is especially the case when your eyes are particularly honed in on gilt frames that feature in the corners of photographs of peoples’ homes on social media. It happened today whilst I was scrolling at speed through ‘X’ (formerly Twitter), when I by chance spotted a portrait of Henry VIII,” the art historian wrote in a blog post.
Adam Busiakiewicz recognized this portrait of the English monarch by its distinctive arched top, which can be found on around 20 other pictures painted in 1590, all depicting eminent personalities of the time, including kings and queens.
Tapestry manufacturer Ralph Sheldon commissioned these works of art to decorate his home. But they were dispersed when Ralph Sheldon’s descendants auctioned them off at Christie’s in 1781.
This oil on wood panel was acquired in 1951 by Warwickshire County Council, which then hung it in one of the rooms of its Shire Hall headquarters.
Following his discovery, Adam Busiakiewicz managed to get a closer look at this portrait of Henry VIII. He says that the painting is in good condition, although it does have some damage.
“The oak panel [on which the portrait is painted] has obviously split in an earlier period, and there is some damage found along the vertical joins which are stable. The face, and many details of the costume and jewelry, are well preserved,” the expert writes on his blog.
“As is usual with paintings of this age, some of the darks have suffered from previous overcleaning and the hands bear areas of clumsy repainting.”
GB£17.56 million for a recently rediscovered Titian
Warwickshire County Council has decided to transfer the painting to its Museum Collections Center for further inspection, reports Artnet News. Its rediscovery has art historians excited.
“He might be the most recognisable English king, but there are only so many portraits of Henry VIII that were painted in the Tudor period. It’s wonderful that a lost portrait from the 1500s, especially one commissioned for and displayed in a Warwickshire home, has been rediscovered; a really important addition to the town’s already rich history,” says Warwick historian Aaron Manning, quoted in the trade magazine.
This is not the first time that a long-lost work of art has reappeared overnight.
In 2019, a Gustav Klimt painting entitled “Portrait of a Lady” was found by two gardeners at the Ricci-Oddi Gallery of Modern Art in the Italian town of Piacenza. It was in this same gallery that the painting had mysteriously disappeared in February 1997, when it was closed for renovation.
Years earlier, Titian’s “Rest on the Flight into Egypt” resurfaced in a plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London after a tip-off. It was offered for sale at Christie’s on July 2, where it fetched GB£17.56 million becoming the most expensive painting by the Italian artist ever sold at auction.