Lost Ruben’s painting of Jesus’ crucifixion auctioned for $2.7M 400 years after it vanished

A rare painting by Peter Paul Rubens depicting the crucifixion of Jesus has sold for a whopping $2.7 million, more than 400 years after it vanished.

The artwork, titled Christ on the Cross, went on sale in Versailles, France, on Sunday, November 30, after it was discovered in a private Paris home amid other, less valuable works by the Flemish artist.

The painting from the early 1600s had disappeared shortly after it was finished and was believed to have wound up with a 19th-century painter before it was handed down again and again.

It is said to be the only Rubens painting depicting “blood and water coming out of the side wound of Christ,” making it especially rare in the art world.

“I immediately had a hunch about this painting, and I did everything I could to try to have it authenticated. And finally, we managed to have it authenticated by the Rubenianum, which is the Rubens committee in Antwerp,” said auctioneer Jean-Pierre Osenat.

Nils Büttner, a Rubens expert, explained that while the Baroque mainstay is best known for his crucifixion works, he rarely opted to depict “the crucified Christ as a dead body on the cross.”

“So this is the one and only painting showing blood and water coming out of the side wound of Christ, and this is something that Rubens only painted once,” Büttner told auctiongoers.

Eric Turquin, an art expert, told the eager bidders that the painting disappeared in the early 1600s not long after it was finished. He said that they believe it somehow fell into the hands of 19th-century French classic painter William Bouguereau, who passed it down in his family until it wound up in the fateful townhouse in Paris.

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