That Record-Breaking £342m Leonardo Da Vinci Painting May Not Have Been Painted By Da Vinci
After the furore surrounding the sale of the last ever privately-owned da Vinci for £342 million last week, it turns out that the master artist's brush stroke possibly never touched the canvas of the Salvator Mundi, with experts claiming it could be a fake.
According to prominent New York Magazine art critic Jerry Saltz, the likelihood of the painting being a real da Vinci is slim, with him telling CTV News that we've all "wished this da Vinci into existence", adding: "I think it's fake art news."
He continues: "The painting is absolutely dead. Its surface is inert, varnished, lurid, scrubbed over, and repainted so many times that it looks simultaneously new and old."
According to Christie's, the painting - whose title translates to 'Saviour of the World' dates from around 1500 and was 100% absolutely, definitely painted by Leonardo da Vinci, with the auction house hyping it up as "the last da Vinci" and "the greatest and most unexpected artistic rediscovery of the 21st century." Even the world's most famous living Leo came to give it a look over.
"I think it's a real flimflam," Saltz said. "I think that if you really look at this painting, Leonardo never painted anyone remotely like this: never anybody looking dead-on, never a surface this dull, inert -a mess! And Christie's claims there's a consensus claiming that it might be real. Actually, it's 12 people and the foremost da Vinci expert in the world thinks on the contrary, that this is not remotely like a da Vinci."
Adding to the voices questioning the paintings authenticity is Michael Daley, an artist and director of ArtWatch UK, which campaigns for the protection of art against damaging treatments, who told The Guardian, "The Salvator Mundi is a heavily made-over wreck of a work with no history before 1900."
Christie's, obviously, disagree, with Loic Gouzer, co-chairman of post-war and contemporary art at Christie's saying after its sale: "Salvator Mundi is a painting of the most iconic figure in the world by the most important artist of all time."
"We are extremely pleased with the record-breaking result for this remarkable and historical work."
We bet you are, fellas.
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