In the News: Missing Klimt painting discovered in the wall of Italian art gallery

by

Leticia Marie Sanchez

The long-lost “Portrait of a Lady” by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt was found hidden in a wall of the Ricci Oddi Modern Art Gallery in Piacenza. The gallery announced that experts deemed the painting to be an authentic work by Klimt. Unbelievably, while gardeners were cleaning ivy off a wall, they discovered the Art Nouveau painting concealed by a trash bag. How the painting ended up in the wall remains a mystery. Presumed to have been stolen, the painting disappeared from the gallery during a building renovation in 1997. Adding to the mystery, the painting’s frame was discovered near the gallery’s skylight after the work vanished, leading some to believe that art thieves could have entered and left through the skylight.

The discovery of this painting is a major coup. This work was deemed the second most valuable art work missing in Italy, after a work by Caravaggio stolen from a church in Sicily.

For the full story, see CNN:

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/klimt-painting-authentic-intl-scli/index.html