Adriaen Hanneman’s Two Children in the Park turned up in September in New Orleans, LA
Photo: Gabriele Bröcker via Staatliches Museum Schwerin

A long lost painting by the Spanish Baroque artist Sebastián de Llanos Valdés, which was missing for over 70 years, has been discovered in England.

According to a DPA report, an unidentified person tried to consign Penitent Maria Magdalena to Christie’s. However, the Staatliche Museum Schwerin, which owns the painting, had previously entered the artwork into Germany’s centralized “Lost Art” database for stolen artworks. And thus the museum has since and auction house were able to negotiate the work’s return. The individual who found and consigned the Valdés has reportedly been offered a reward by way of compensation.

In order to protect its artworks from allied air strikes, the Staatliche Museum Schwerin moved portions of its collection to various safe houses in the countryside of the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern shortly before the outbreak of World War II. Several artworks, including the Valdés painting, disappeared from one of those storage facilities, Krumbeck Palace, after the War ended.

It is the second time this year that an artwork form the Staatliche Museum Schwerin has been found. In September the FBI tracked down Two Children in the Park, an unsigned canvas attributed to the Dutch artist Adriaen Hanneman. The painting which disappeared from Ivenack Palace, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern was found in a private collection in New Orleans.