Missing Velázquez masterpiece found after 300 years - BBC Newsnight

Olimpia Maidalchini was one of the most powerful women in 17th-century Rome. Her portrait, by Spanish painter Diego Velázquez has been missing since 1724 - until now.
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Pope Innocent X presided over the influential Vatican state in the seventeenth century but the real power behind the papal throne belonged to the Pope’s sister in law and reputed lover Donna Olimpia Maidalchini.
A feminist before her time, she was immortalised by one of the greatest ever portrait painters, Diego Velázquez.
The painting has been missing for 300 years, until now, and it's going on sale at Sotheby's in London with a price tag of £3 million.
Culture Correspondent Stephen Smith reports.
Newsnight is the BBC's flagship news and current affairs TV programme - with analysis, debate, exclusives, and robust interviews.
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[@UserMum7512]

The way they are handling the painting stirs my soul

[@deckiedeckie]

VELAZQUEZ......"QEZ" THE "U" IS MUTE!!

[@redangrybird7564]

It infuriates me every time I hear pronounced it wrong. Cheers ✌😷

[@pam2718]

Mistress of the Vatican by Elanor Herman showed just how controlling and entertaining Olimpia was.

[@phantomthiefirwin9631]

I can see why she would be/is popular amongst "certain" women

[@taylorj6177]

Bc they know it's liekly fake.

[@bmeeseeks2881]

I thought it was a painting of a man lol.

Sotheby's seems to find a new $300 million masterpiece every 5 years. Fake or fortune?

[@rupertprawnworthy758]

It sold for £2,375,000

[@QueenBee-gx4rp]

Olympia looks “tres formidable” !! It’s ridiculous to think that throughout history there haven’t been many women like her.

[@elhijodelsol5064]

"A feminist before her time"? It would be interesting to know exactly what kind of definition of 'Feminism' has who ever wrote that statement. According to Merriam-Webster dictionary, feminism is: 1: the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes 2: organized activity on behalf of women's rights and interests. Does Olimpia Maidalchini behavior fit in any of those definitions? According to many historians, she was nothing but a golddigger, there are legends that she left for 3 days the dead body of the Pope Innocent X locked up in his chambers after he died and she took all the gold he kept with her.

[@lettylunasical4766]

I read on one of the papers reporting this that she fought for more rights for women, so probably that.

[@jgrau5089]

Pope Innocent X was a feared man, and when his assistants first saw the finished portrait they panicked, they said it was to life like and that it showed his toughness. The Pope loved it, and hanged it outside his office..

[@mariapilarme]

That’s not a Velazquez work. You can see a great artist how they paint hands. The hands on the Olympia are very bad done. Auction houses pushed false authentications just to make money. To me is like selling a fake painting. It looks to me a bad copy done to be deceptive. That’s not the brushwork of Velazquez, the so called experts can even see the drawing on the painting is poor. Buyers be aware.

[@red.aries1444]

She's wearing a glove, so it's not easy to compare her hand to other works by Velasquez. And if he had not much time to finish the painting, he maybe put more attention to the face than on the other parts of her body. Maybe the painting was finished by an assistant - or the hand has been overpainted in a restoration.

[@jeanmichelbasquiat4444]

I disagree, you can clearly tell by the paint application that it is.

[@michaelbyrd7883]

I really like painting and sketches down of ugly or grotesque looking people, for instance by Leonardo or Rembrandt, however not all painting of ugly people have character in their faces this is just a painting of an ugly woman and though Velasquez is one of old masters, a lot of his paintings I don't care for?

[@debbiandrews1981]

I agree, he paints their faces so... lumpy???

[@omnilife691]

Very little resect for this painting. lets put it here on the floor by my shoe....

[@mansteinman]

Fake

[@jonathaneffemey944]

Thanks for posting

[@stephendaltonclassicallytr849]

Francis Bacon was Irish. So bored of the BBC and other British media outlets claiming great Irish people as their own.

[@CarmenGomez-tg4dt]

I have two of Velasquez actual paintings! They are not prints. They are paintings of little Teresa, his Daughter or Granddaughter. How much are they worth, do you think? Are these paintings worth

[@micbite]

The first feminist

[@MassimoStorytellerGuide]

Genius song for the Video :D

[@sleeplessinthecarolinas8118]

I wouldn't purchase this picture at a garage sale.

[@jeanmichelbasquiat4444]

Shows how much you know about a master portrait painter. Technically probably the greatest portrait painter in the history of art. Better than Rembrandt and Sargent.

[@verucasalt9182]

@@jeanmichelbasquiat4444Velazquez painted the soul of the people who he painted . A unique gift.

[@robertarevalo5137]

HaHa... That's funny....

[@mansteinman]

No es un VELAZQUEZ FAKE

[@jeanmichelbasquiat4444]

Wrong!

[@mansteinman]

No es un Velazquez

[@jeanmichelbasquiat4444]

si es.

[@jamescullen6973]

That’s a man , the pope wasn’t into woman

[@kevinchambers4848]

Have any of them ever been into women?