Researchers have just discovered that a Sandro Botticelli painting long believed to be a fake is in fact the real deal — or at the very least came from the very workshop where the great artist himself created his masterpieces, CNN reported.
Conservation charity organization English Heritage announced the news this week after conducting extensive tests to determine the authenticity of what was believed to be a later imitation of the 15th-century masterpiece "Madonna of the Pomegranate," which is on display in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.
According to the charity, experts dismissed the version of Botticelli's 15th-century painting "Madonna of the Pomegranate" as a "fake" because of variations in detail the thick layer of yellow varnish that covered it. When conservators cleaned the artwork, its true colors showed — literally.
"Being able to closely examine and conserve this painting for the first time in over 100 years has really given us the chance to get up-close and personal with the paintwork," explained Rachel Turnbull, English Heritage’s senior collections conservator. "I noticed instantly that the painting bore a striking resemblance to the workshop of Botticelli himself; stylistically it was too similar to be an imitation, it was of the right period, it was technically correct and it was painted on poplar, a material commonly used at the time."
Further testing confirmed that the painting had been produced in Botticelli's workshop in Florence however experts could not conclusively determine that it was the great artist himself that created the piece or whether it was one of his assistants employed at the time to help him create smaller versions of popular works.
Regardless of whose hand was holding the brush, it does not detract from the magnitude of the discovery. The painting will be on display on April 1 at Ranger's House in Greenwich, which is home to the Wernher Collection -– an assortment of over 700 works of fine and decorative art amassed by diamond magnate Julius Wernher in the late 19th century.