James Stunt's Van Dycks find new homes, with revised attributions and higher price tags

With a joint fortune of ￡5.5 billion at stake, the marriage between Bernie Ecclestone’s daughter, Petra, and the flamboyant businessman, James Stunt, made headlines when it ground to a halt this year. Among the assets is an impressive art collection, built by Stunt and ranging from Rembrandt to Picasso, with a focus on King Charles I’s favourite painter, Sir Anthony van Dyck.

Whether it had anything to do with the divorce is not known, but last week Stunt sold two of his Van Dycks at Christie’s in New York, where a double portrait of the Apostles St Paul and St Thomas achieved $468,500 (￡336,000), and a portrait of the artist’s friend, Fran?ois Langlois, went for $1.8 million (￡1.3 million).

Perhaps more interesting than who was selling, though, was the change in the attribution and price of these paintings since they were last sold at auction.

Just over three years ago, when they were sold at Christie’s in London, the Apostles were catalogued as “Studio of Sir Anthony van Dyck” (i.e. by the hand of one of his studio assistants), with an estimate of ￡40,000. Clearly, more than one person thought they might be by the artist himself, as they eventually sold for ￡110,000 ($173,000).

The portrait of Langlois, meanwhile, also offered as “Studio of Sir Anthony van Dyck”, at Christie’s New York in 2012, sparked similar speculative interest, since it sold for $386,500 against an estimate of $80,000.

But it wasn’t Stunt who made that handsome $1.7 million. The buyer of both paintings had been Fergus Hall, an Old Master dealer with a particular interest in Van Dyck, who, having cleaned and researched the paintings, sold them to Stunt as fully attributed Van Dycks.

Interestingly, Van Dyck has had more re-attributions than any other Old Master in recent times. Philip Mould, presenter of the BBC’s Fake or Fortune, traces this phenomenon to the publication of the first reliable catalogue raisonné in 2004, which allowed for detailed study of nearly 800 examples of the artist’s work.

Of the catalogue’s four original scholars, only two are still alive, and a number of former museum directors have offered their views on attribution since. It’s differences in opinion that have allowed additional works to be added to the recognised Van Dyck corpus.

Because Van Dyck was prolific and used studio assistants in his work, it can be tricky to unravel how much of a painting is solely by the master. Consequently, the number of works attributed to him, his studio and his many followers is plentiful. Around 300 have come up for auction in the last four years, with dozens subsequently upgraded with a full attribution.

Mould’s favourite is a self-portrait that he found at auction in Germany, in 2012. Thought to be a copy and with a €30,000 estimate, he bought it for €572,000. By 2015 he had sold it on privately, since it appeared at the Minneapolis Institute of Art on loan from the American investment financier, Scott Minerd.

Taking some credit for the change in status was Mould’s researcher, Bendor Grosvenor, now a TV presenter in his own right and also a Van Dyck connoisseur, who has been quietly accumulating a small collection of discoveries of his own.

But while Grosvenor prefers to keep his finds, his friend, Fergus Hall, is in the business of selling, his trained eye capable of recognising Van Dyck’s touch even through centuries of dirt, degraded varnish and additional paint. It is only after painstaking cleaning, though, that the full picture emerges.

The most expensive pieces of art ever sold

In the case of the Apostles, for instance, a panel maker’s mark that corresponded to marks on the back of three early apostles by Van Dyck in the Gem?ldegalerie in Dresden, was revealed. Subsequent dendrochronological testing (dating a piece of wood by tree rings) of the panels confirmed they were painted very early in Van Dyck’s career, which fitted with Hall’s theory.

In the case of the Langlois portrait, previously thought to be a studio copy of a painting that is part-owned by the National Gallery, close examination of the documentary evidence revealed that Van Dyck had made two versions of the portrait – one for the sitter (Stunt’s), and one for Van Dyck to keep (the National Gallery’s).

At this rate, the 2004 catalogue raisonné is going to need updating fairly soon – if everyone can agree on things, that is.