Overview
- The auction at Hôtel Drouot, scheduled for March 23, was suspended after the Culture Ministry classified the drawing a national treasure and barred its export for 30 months.
- Under French law, this designation blocks the work from leaving the country to let public institutions try to match the market price for a type of Baldung portrait not held in French museums.
- The work is a small 1517 silverpoint portrait of Susanna Pfeffinger, signed with the artist’s monogram and rediscovered in a probate review after about 500 years in her Strasbourg family.
- Specialists Patrick de Bayser, Christof Metzger, and Dorit Schäfer validated the attribution to Hans Baldung Grien, noting the rarity of such silverpoint portraits.
- The sellers paused the public sale to seek a private deal in France during the ban, with estimates of €1.5 million to €3 million and a past Baldung drawing selling for more than $3.7 million in 2007.