An unsigned portrait reputedly by the Dutch master Rembrandt has turned up in a Camden, Maine, attic. First estimated to bring $10,000 to $15,000, it surprised expectations by selling for $1.4 million at Thomaston Place Auction Galleries. The buyer? A private buyer from the U.K.
“I never thought I’d take part in selling a lot for over a million dollars,” said Zebulon Casperson, a staffer with Thomaston Place Auction Galleries, who represented the winning bidder over the phone. “It’s like almost a win for me and the team here.”The auction room described Lot 2363 as,
AFTER REMBRANDT HARMENSZOON VAN RIJN (NETH, 1606-1669) “Portrait of a Girl,” oil on cradled oak panel, unsigned, label verso from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, lent for a 1970 exhibition. In a hand-carved Dutch gold frame, OS: 28 1/2″ x 24 1/2″, SS: 20 1/2″ x 16 1/2″.
The painting, Portrait of Girl after Rembrandt, was found during a routine house call by Kaja Veilleux, the founder, appraiser, and auctioneer behind Thomaston Place. Veilleux said, “We often go in blind. The home was filled with wonderful pieces, but in the attic, among stacks of art, we found this remarkable portrait.” The perfectly preserved artwork is an oil painting on a cradled oak panel. It is a portrait of a young teen girl in a plain black robe with a frilly white collar and cap set against a plain background. The portrait is framed in a gold, hand-carved Dutch frame.
Following the discovery of Da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi a decade ago in a small provincial American auction, dealers are scouring auction houses for the next big find.
Whereas the style, especially with respect to the use of light, strongly suggested some sort of connection with Rembrandt, the real surprise was on the reverse side. A Philadelphia Museum of Art label said Mr. Cary W. Bok, the scion of the Curtis Publishing Company fortune, had lent the painting to the museum in 1970 as Rembrandt Portrait of Girl. Camden-based Bok apparently may or may not have sold it via his family, and Veilleux wouldn’t disclose the consignor’s name.
The Philadelphia Museum of Art was unable to confirm which exhibition the portrait might have appeared in, and they supported the claim that the label does not authenticate the work. On account of this, Portrait of Girl went to auction on August 24th as a painting done “after Rembrandt.” According to Live Auctioneers, the work is from the 1630s, when Rembrandt supervised portrait commissions at Hendrick Uylenburgh’s studio.
Despite all these doubts, the portrait generated a fever of excitement. Bidding opened on the second day of Thomaston’s Summer Grandeur sale at $32,500-way over the estimate and soared upwards through 60 bids by eleven different bidders, two in the room, nine on the phone. The pace was swift and furious, with most increments at $25,000. By the time it reached $900,000, only two phone bidders were still contesting.
With this sale, it now stands as one of Maine’s most expensive works of art ever sold. For comparison, the most expensive legitimate Rembrandt, Portrait of Marten Looten, painted in 1632, sold for $33.8 million in 2015.