New Da Vinci Painting Discovered, Experts Believe (VIDEO)

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By ROB GILLIES, Associated Press Writer

TORONTO - Art experts believe they have identified a new Leonardo da Vinci -- in part by examining a fingerprint on the canvas.

Peter Paul Biro, a Montreal-based forensic art expert, said Tuesday a fingerprint on what was presumed to be a 19th-century German painting of a young woman has convinced art experts that it's actually a da Vinci.

Biro said Canadian-born art collector Peter Silverman bought "La Bella Principessa" at auction in 1997 for about $19,000. One London art dealer now says it's worth over $150 million.

If experts are correct, it will be the first major work by da Vinci to be identified in 100 years.

Biro said the print of an index or middle finger was found on the painting and that it matched a fingerprint from da Vinci's St Jerome in the Vatican. Biro examined 3-D images of the painting taken by the Luminere Technology laboratory in Paris. The lab used a special 3-D digital scanner to show successive layers of the work.

"Leonardo used his hands liberally and frequently as part of his painting technique. His fingerprints are found on many of his works," Biro said. "I was able to make use of multispectral images to make a little smudge a very readable fingerprint."

Technical, stylistic and material composition evidence also point to it being a da Vinci. Biro said there's strong consensus among art experts that it is a da Vinci painting.

"I would say it is priceless. There aren't that many Leonardo's in existence," Biro said. He said he had heard that one London dealer felt it could be worth 100 million British pounds (more than $150 million).

Asked what Silverman's reaction was when he found out about the fingerprint, Biro said: "There was already a fairly good consensus about the piece before I was asked to consult on this case. Peter's reaction was that the fingerprint was the icing on the cake. Those were his words."

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Comments

[wadenelson1]

10:40 AM on 10/14/2009

This is everything that is wrong with the art world.

A boring, $19,000 painting that wouldn't even excite the experts on "Antiques Road Show."

But now, because its been proven to be a Leonardo, it's worth $150 million.

It's still a boring, ho-hum painting.

[JDM73]

08:24 PM on 10/14/2009

"It's still a boring, ho-hum painting."

By whose standards? While art is entirely subjective, the fact remains that there are very few paintings known to have been executed by Leonardo, and it's a major event when another one is found.
Above and beyond that, a lot of us still enjoy looking at his work :)

[FZliveson]

10:10 AM on 10/14/2009

Hooray...now they can use all that technology to find the "black-boxes" from the Air France crash and help the friends and relatives of the deceased to get some closure; not to mention the tens of thousands who fly, white-knuckled every day in Airbus aluminum tubing, hoping and praying they get to their destination alive and in one piece.

[binarystar]

10:41 AM on 10/14/2009

that was certainly the most random comment i've read in a very long time.

[FZliveson]

03:12 PM on 10/14/2009

Correction---- 400 some-odd years old, not 700 years old.
(bein' accurate as possible)

[MosheDayanHero]

11:35 AM on 10/14/2009

FZliveson's genetic pool requires a lot more chlorine.

[FZliveson]

03:09 PM on 10/14/2009

Hey, Six-point--- I have traced my ancestry back to 5-generations before William the Conquerer. They all did just fine, thank you very much. I have a long list of inventors, pioneers, farmers, professionals and community service employed people in my ancestry.
You know NOTHING about my gene pool.
WTF are you chlorinating about?

[Slingingstones]

08:14 AM on 10/14/2009

Lionardo di Sir Piero, left a fingerprint on the canvas just to tease us. It's as if he knew future beings would find him out. How clever and omniscient of him.

[Plakias]

08:04 AM on 10/14/2009

Interesting! Although it always strikes a little fear into my heart when a report is based on a 'belief'. Anyhow, it's pretty incredible that technology these days makes it possible to analyze fingerprints which are 100s of years old and actually pinpoint them as belonging to a specific individual. Who knows, perhaps the painting or something like it will appear one day on DubLi. That would be awesome.

[naan]

07:54 AM on 10/14/2009

this story has hoax written all over it. are these the same people that turned up the ossuary that belonged to jesus's bro james? of course nobody believed that one either and then the said ossuary mysteriously' sustained damaged while in transit presumably to collect the insurance on it now that it was worthless..peter paul biro has a very amateurish looking low-res website for a 'bigtime' forensic art detective..

[lastpost]

07:50 AM on 10/14/2009

“Experts Believe”

Is worth of a painting determined by appearance, or by the reputation of the executing artist ? Does a poor painting with a fingerprint have more value, than a masterpiece with no print? Is attraction inherent in artistry, or does it condense as cold calculation in the rendition of the beholder? Does art have intrinsic and universal significance? Or is art, whatever you can get away with? The Emperor’s suit of clothes, in a frame.

[JDM73]

07:31 AM on 10/14/2009

Certainly seems to be an early Leonardo. He did at least one other portrait of a young woman in profile, and this painting looks very similar to that one.
What was the verdict on the Battle of Anghiari a year or so ago? Has it or hasn't it been rediscovered?

[Amorifera]

06:04 AM on 10/14/2009

It always annoys me when people refer to Leonardo as "da Vinci". Da Vinci was not his last name. He was Leonardo who lived in Vinci, thus "da Vinci". It should be referred to as a "Leonardo" painting. It's like referring to a piece of art as a "from Hoboken" painting.

[Cycadeoidea]

08:27 AM on 10/14/2009

That's nothing. Poor Doménikos Theotokópoulos is simply known to the world as "The Greek."

[ukulelebailey]

10:15 AM on 10/14/2009

Lenny da Hoboken?

[Troutboi]

03:37 AM on 10/14/2009

Wonder, if Bill Gates will add this to his da Vinci collection someday?

[MosheDayanHero]

03:21 AM on 10/14/2009

Next person mentioning Brown ( incl. children who'll do it just becuase of my post) will be exiled to Siberia of blogs--Truthdig or FoxNews.

[Decidedvoter08]

03:41 AM on 10/14/2009

Is that like Beetlejuice? Dan Brown, Dan Brown, Dan Brown. It's OK he isn't magically appearing.

I have my doubt about this painting.....it looks touched up in some way.....sort of seems a bit different then his other works, I can't help but wonder if it was not fully executed by Da Vinci

[mudshark12]

02:15 AM on 10/14/2009

Fingerprints don't lie, artists go through periods where their style of painting changes as they grow older and acquire more experience. Artists also are trying to convey emotions through their artwork and this can be quite subtle. I'm 99% sure the painting is genuine based on the fingerprint alone, fingerprints are unique.

[ObamaNation0812]

01:52 AM on 10/14/2009

"wow, i've feel like I've known you for ages..."

[ObamaNation0812]

01:51 AM on 10/14/2009

"known"

[pov]

01:51 AM on 10/14/2009

This means, Dan Brown will have a brand new book called 'A Profile of A Forgery of A Florentine.'

[zola77]

01:51 AM on 10/14/2009

(groan) Not another one!

[ObamaNation0812]

01:50 AM on 10/14/2009

Wow that is incredible, incredible story...and, it's true, even the experts sometimes are fooled for decades or centuries and a gem goes around and around from house to house to house... room to room and wall to wall... until one fine day the light comes out... it is kinda cool how life does this to "things." and, to us, to a certain extent... we may go lifetimes without seeing one another and one fine day we just do and it's like: "wow, I feel like I've know for ages..."

mysterious ways this life works in,,,