Rare Donatello Relief Goes Up For Auction

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Jan 18th 2006 at 11:02AM

The loss of an Italian church may be your gain if you have a few million dollars. The Independent reports that the parishioners of San Giovanni Battista Church in Padua sold a terracotta relief of the Madonna and Child in 1902 in order to pay for a new organ. The piece is now going up for auction at Sotheby's in New York on January 26 and is expected to sell for up to $6 million. The piece was so covered in stucco and paint that the last time it came up for auction in 1990 it didn't sell. A recent cleaning and new research however assured the fact that it is definitely a Donatello, making it extremely valuable since there is only one Donatello in a public collection in the U.S.

Tags: art, art history, artists, auction, donatello, italian art, renaissance, sotheby's

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