Britain may lose Velasquez work

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32521, 3 February 1971, Page 13

Britain may lose Velasquez work

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright) LONDON, Feb. 2. The British Government has turned a blind eye to a request for £2m to keep a Velasquez portrait in Britain. The painting of the Spanish master’s Mulatto servant, Juan de Pareja, was sold in November to a New York dealer for a world record auction price of £2,310,000, and since then

there have been demands in the British art world that the painting should remain here. But last night, the Minister of Education (Mrs Margaret Thatcher) told a questioner in the House of Commons that the Government had considered and refused a request, from the National Gallery for a special grant of £2m to enable it to buy the painting, though the Government fully recognised the great merits of the painting. To get the painting out of

Britain, the New York dealer, Wildenstein, needs an export licence. A special Government committee on art exports has recommended that an export licence be withheld while attempts are made to match Wildenstein’s price for the painting. Observers say that the Government’s refusal is a bitter blow to those who wish to keep the painting in Britain. If the money cannot be raised by public subscription the painting will go to America, they say.