The sketches were found when the painting “Nudo con cappello” was x-rayed as part of a thorough forensic investigation for an upcoming exhibition in Philadelphia.
X-ray image of the painting “Nudo con cappello” where the three sketches were found under the canvas. Stock Photography.
The Italian-born artist Amadeo Modigliani is seen as one of the great modernist artists of the 20th century. He lived a short, turbulent and bohemian life in France where his nude paintings created great controversy. When Modigliani first showed his series of nude paintings in 1917, they were considered so shocking that the police closed the exhibition in Paris, after it triggered traffic chaos.
When he died, only 35 years old, he was destitute, but today he sells works for many millions, for example “Nu couché” which was sold for almost the equivalent of 1.5 billion Swedish kronor at auction in 2015, which makes it one of the most expensive the paintings ever sold.
This is not the first time that hidden works have been found in Modigliani’s works. In 2018, X-ray technology revealed a previously unknown portrait under one of the canvases at London’s Tate Gallery.