In Episode Two, Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate whether a delicate drawing inherited by Henrietta Sitwell is by one of the modern art world’s most famous names, Amedeo Modigliani.
Henrietta inherited the sketch from her father, who had inherited it from his father, the writer and art collector Sacheverell Sitwell. Sacheverell was, along with his two siblings Osbert and Edith, a central member of the Bright Young Things of the 1920s and a key figure in the world of British art. A direct connection to such an established and respected name might normally be enough to guarantee the authenticity of a work but, with an artist as regularly forged as Modigliani, it’s not so simple. In fact, a leading auction house recently cast doubt on its authenticity. If the work is genuine, it could be worth up to £100,000. If not, just a few hundred.
Philip takes the sketch to be examined forensically, chemically testing the age of the paper to see whether it dates from before Modigliani’s death in 1920, at the age of just 35. Armed with further material evidence, he brings the sketch to the Pompidou Centre in Paris to compare it with a known Modigliani sketchbook. Also, we meet with handwriting expert Adam Brand to see whether the dedication and signature match with any of the hundreds of confirmed Modigliani signatures.
Fiona delves deep into the extensive Sitwell family archives to find any hard evidence for the picture’s provenance. The family story is that Sacheverell bought this work sometime after the First World War. Can we find any written proof of this? The picture is dedicated to 'Zborowski' - the name of Modigliani’s friend and art dealer Leopold Zborowski. Why would Sacheverell have owned a picture dedicated to someone else? Travelling to the Montmartre streets where Modigliani lived and worked, Fiona outlines the connections between the artist, his dealer and Henrietta’s grandfather.
Will it be a Modigliani?
