If you have an old painting, look at it carefully. You, too, may be lucky. Another masterpiece has been found in a closet, this time in a storage room at an art gallery in Iowa. The painting was dirty, damaged and on a cracked board, but the director of the gallery Robert Warren noticed a sticker on the back and did some research. He learned it was an auction sticker. Art experts and conservators who saw the painting decided it was by Otto van Veen (1556-1629) a famous Dutch artist. Estimated value, $4 million to $11 million. It is a scene with Apollo and a naked Venus and a cherub (perhaps Cupid). The picture was probably painted between 1595 and 1600. The gallery has no plans to sell their treasure now, but it has been restored and is being displayed. We wonder who is the legal owner of the painting? Is it the gallery, the woman’s club that was given the painting and may be the ones who took the painting to the gallery to be sold, or relatives of Nason Collins who loaned the picture to a museum in the early 1900s?

Photo: Duane Tinkey