Man who sold a painting at a bargain sues Sotheby’s

A former owner of a painting who sold it at a bargain sued an auction house after it was later claimed as an 11-million-pound (18.6 billion won) Caravaggio.

According to the BBC, Lancelot Thwaytes, who inherited the work, sold the painting of Caravaggio, a 16th century Italian painter, in 2006 for 42,000 pounds (71 million won) through Sotheby’s.

The auction house thought the painting was a copy of a genuine Caravaggio’s work, entitled The Cardsharps, at the time of auctioning. Afterwards, renowned art collector Sir Denis Mahon valued the work as a genuine Caravaggio worth 11 million pounds. The British seller, who was angry over this, sued Sotheby’s recently. Sotheby’s robustly defends that the painting is not a genuine Caravaggio, saying, “It was valued by best experts.”

It is not sure which side is right. However, given that the Thwaytes family sold a genuine Caravaggio to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in the 1950s, the painting is likely to be a genuine one.

Caravaggio, a renowned painter in the early Baroque era in Italy, is considered as a pioneer of the 17th century European painting and famous for a stark contrast of light and shadows. He left only some 50 paintings and they are very expensive.