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Series 13: 3. A Modern Masterpiece for £35?

Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould investigate a mysterious unsigned landscape that was snapped up at auction for just £35. Could it be a lost work by Frances Hodgkins, the trailblazing New Zealand-born artist who became one of the most original voices in British modernism?\n\nArt blogger Robjn Cantus was browsing an online auction when he spotted a group of pictures that caught his interest. He bought the lot for £35, shared images of the artworks online, and received an intriguing tip-off from a reader. They suggested that one of the mystery paintings could be the work of Frances Hodgkins, whose vibrant, avant-garde style helped reshape the British art scene between the wars. If it’s genuine, it could be worth as much as £50,000.\n\nRobjn turns to the Fake or Fortune team for help, but admits that his initial impression of the striking, colourful picture was that it might have been painted by a schoolchild. He has a hunch that the artwork was part of a post-war scheme called Pictures for Schools, which placed original art in classrooms to inspire young minds. But how Pictures for Schools could have acquired the painting remains a puzzle. With no signature, scant provenance, and another name attached, Robjn’s picture poses one of the team’s most challenging investigations yet.\n\nFiona and Philip follow a trail that leads from school archives in Hertfordshire to the gold mines of rural south Wales, and to a 1943 wartime exhibition in London, where Hodgkins exhibited her work alongside none other than Pablo Picasso.\n\nWorking with leading experts in both the UK and New Zealand, the team turns to cutting-edge forensic analysis, including pigment testing carried out in collaboration with the Auckland Art Gallery - home to the world’s largest collection of Hodgkins’s work. But with little documentation and only a fleeting mention of Robjn’s picture on the same inventory page as Hodgkins’s name, is the evidence strong enough to convince the experts?\n\nThe final call lies with Mary Kisler, the foremost authority on Frances Hodgkins. Could this schoolroom curiosity really be a £50,000 missing masterpiece, or just a case of mistaken identity?

Source: BBC 1