by A Madonna and a child picture from the 16th century, which ended with a woman in Norfolk after it was stolen from a museum in Italy half a century ago, is to be returned to its rightful owners.
After years of searching for soul and conviction of an artistry that acted Pro Bono, Barbara de Dozsa decided to hand it over to the Belluno Civic Museum, which last saw the painting in 1973.
As the Guardian reported in March, she had refused to return the work of art, although it is located on the most popular lists of different police forces, including Interpol and the Italian Karabinieri.
She had, partly because her former husband, the late Baron de Dozsa, bought it in 1973 shortly after the robbery.
Until her divorce, it was in her home house from the 16th century, East Barsham Manor near Fakenham, described by Henry VIII as his “small country palace”.
It was painted by the Italian artist Antonio Solario, known as Lo Zingaro (The Gypsy), of which other pictures are in the National Gallery in London.
Belluno acquired in 1872 and belonged to several works that were stolen a century later. Some were soon recovered in Austria, where the husband of de Dozs bought the Solario painting from an unnamed source.
The whereabouts were unknown until 2017 when De Dozsa tried to sell it through a regional auction house, and someone who was connected to the Belluno Museum was discovered by someone.
The painting was returned to de Dozsa in 2020, since delays caused by the Covid closure caused the Italian authorities to be unable to deliver relevant documents that were requested by the British police.
Over the years, Christopher Marinello, a leading specialist for art rolls, had repeatedly tried to persuade them to do “the right thing” and to return them to Belluno. He treated the Restoring negotiations based on Pro-Bono because he wanted to help the city in the Venetiens region of northern Italy from which his family comes from.
De Dozsa first quoted the British Limitation Act of 1980, in which a person who buys stolen goods can be recognized as a legal owner if the purchase was not connected to the theft after more than six years.
Marinello dismissed this argument as “nonsense”. He said: “While the British Limitation Act certainly supported its position, the fact that the painting on the Interpol and Carabinieri -stolen art databases was listed that the painting could never be sold, exhibited or even transported without the risk of confiscation.”
He is the founder of Art Recovery International, which focuses on stolen or looted art and is based in London, Venice and New York. His previous restoration includes a Matisse painting that was stolen from the Stockholms Museum of Modern Art in 1987 and had disappeared without a trace for 25 years until it appeared in London.
De Dozsa finally agreed to publish the painting unconditionally to Belluno.
Marinello said: “She restored my confidence in humanity when so many owners of stolen works of art are trying to capture it. Despite the victim’s rights, people have no more sympathy and it has proven the opposite.”
He joked: “When it comes to returning stolen art and doing the right thing, I can be annoyingly stubborn. But in the end it was Barbara de Dozsa’s decision, and she decided to make a careful one.”
He praised Arte Generali, the art insurance company, which enabled the restoration with a donation to cover the logistical costs, even though it was not connected with this case. “This recovery would never have happened without her support,” said Marinello.
Another Madonna and another child in the Italian artist of the 19th century, Placido Fabris, is, among other things, stolen paintings that are missing from Belluno. They are listed in the Carabinieri stolen art database.
Marinello asks the public to contact him if you recognize one of you in private or public collections: “Solario made it to Great Britain, why not this?”
Oscar de Pellegrin, the mayor of Belluno, said: “Returning this painting to the city means returning a fragment of his identity, his history and soul.”
De Dozsa rejected a statement.
