Echo

Manhattan's Metropolitan Museum had raised a shout of joy last January over its purchase of a 15th Century painting of Saint Sebastian. Attributed to Andrea del Castagno, and authenticated by Renaissance Expert Bernard Berenson, it was one of the best pictures the museum had acquired in years.

Last week the Metropolitan's joy was raising a sorrowful echo in Rome. Sebastian, it appeared, had belonged to the family of a Fascist nobleman, Count Francesco de Larderel, who fled Florence ahead of the liberation. Charging that the picture had been illegally smuggled out of Italy, the Italian government asked the U.S. State Department's help in tracing the story down.

The Metropolitan had bought the picture (for a reputed $200,000) from Knoedler's, a 57th Street gallery which had bought it "deliverable in Manhattan" from "someone" abroad. The diplomatic exchanges would take some time. Meanwhile Knoedler's wasn't saying who the "someone" was, and the museum held on to its saint.

Starting at the opposite end of the trail, Italy last week arrested a Florentine lawyer along with two minor employees in the government's art export control office, accused them of forging the papers that got Sebastian out of Italy.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.