An antique collector visited a Minnesota garage sale a few years ago and paid $50 for a painting of a fisherman.
Now, some experts believe it might be a long-lost work from Vincent van Gogh worth millions.
The garage sale painting might be a previously-unknown work called “Elimar,” painted in 1889, while the artist spent a year committed to a psychiatric asylum, according to a new report released by a team of experts, historians and conservationists. “The Starry Night” was also painted during this period.
A New York-based art research firm LMI Group International purchased the painting from the unnamed owner for an undisclosed sum in 2019, according to the Wall Street Journal, which says the group has invested $30,000 into the investigation and believes it could be worth $15 million.
The report, which was prepared on behalf of LMI by a group of scholars and independent researchers, is exhaustive — taking four years of research and numbering 458 pages. The report said van Gogh based the work on a Danish artist’s work which depicts a fisherman from the northern tip of Denmark.
“The discovery of a previously unknown van Gogh painting should come as no surprise,” the report says. “It is well-known that van Gogh lost many works, gave away works to friends and was not particularly careful about any work he considered a study.”
Details as seemingly minute as the thread count of the canvas, which researchers concluded matched those made during the period, allowed the team to assess the painting is a true Van Gogh. They even used DNA analysis of hair found stuck to the painting to confirm it belonged to someone with red or reddish-brown hair.
Despite their findings, the authenticity of the painting and its attribution to Van Gogh, is up to the van Gogh museum in Amsterdam, which has not yet commented.
Van Gogh produced around 900 paintings during his life, nearly all of which are either in public museums or tucked away in private collections, changing hands in private and secretive transactions for unknown but likely record-breaking sums.
The most expensive Van Gogh sale at public auction was “Orchard with Cypresses” from the collection of Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen, which sold as part of his estate in 2022 for $117.2 million.
Other notable public sales include “The Portrait of Dr Paul Gachet” for $82.5 million in 1990 and “Laborer in a Field” for $81.3 million in 2017.
If “Elimar” is found to be authentic, the $50 find would become a $15 million treasure.
Will Stern is a reporter and editor for cllct.