A newly discovered portrait of Olimpia Pamphilj by Diego Velazquez comes up at Sotheby’s Old Master sale in London on July 3. Lost for almost three centuries, this captivating portrait once formed part of the collection of Don Gaspar Mendez de Haro y Guzman, 7thMarques del Carpio. It was last recorded in 1724. Olimpia Maidalchini Pamphilj – sister-in-law, reputed lover and puppet master of Pope Innocent X – controlled all aspects of Vatican life and was known as Papessa. Her influence over the pontiff was well-known with one Cardinal, Alessandro Bichi, on the election of Innocent in October 1644, supposedly angrily declaring, “Gentlemen, we have just elected a female pope.”
Painted in 1649-50 during Velázquez’s second trip to Rome, the Portrait of Olimpia Maidalchini Pamphilj is estimated at £2 – 3 million. Sotheby’s say that this is one of the strongest Old Master sales ever staged with major works by the titans of British Art – Thomas Gainsborough, John Constable, J.M.W. Turner – as well as leading Renaissance and Baroque painters Botticelli, Pieter Brueghel the Younger and Sir Peter Paul Rubens.
