Earl to sell another art masterpiece

The Earl of Wemyss is to sell The Crucifixion of St Andrew by the 17th-century Italian master Carlo Maratta for £2 million - the latest of several masterpieces to be sold from one of the richest private art collections in Scotland.

The painting goes on sale at the Maastricht art and antiques fair - the biggest in the world - next week. Other versions of the work, depicting St Andrew falling to his knees in adoration of the cross awaiting him, are in the Louvre and the United States.

Other major paintings sold from the family seat at Gosford House in East Lothian in the past year include a 6 million Poussin and 1.6 million painting by 17th-century Dutch artist Jan de Bray.

The sales follow the death of the 12th Earl of Wemyss in 2008.

The Gosford House collection, mostly built up by the powerful and wealthy Wemyss family in the 19th and early 20th century, has included works by artists from Rubens to Raeburn.

A former keeper of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Duncan Thomson, who is familiar with the Gosford collection, said it was sad to see the sales.

He said: "It's a great collection, and it always quite sad to see a collection of this sort selling off its masterpieces. It's the best pictures that get sold, because they are the ones that produce the money."

In 1999, a Botticelli masterpiece belonging to the family was sold to the National Galleries of Scotland for 10.5 million. The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child became one of the signature works in Scotland's national collection.

Sir Timothy Clifford, the director-general of the galleries at the time, is now a consultant to the London dealer Simon Dickinson, who has handled the Gosford sales.

The annual TEFAF Maastricht art fair is the world's foremost gathering of dealers and buyers, and the Wemyss Maratta will go on sale to an international clientle alongside multi-million- pound works from Henry Moore to Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

Maratta's Crucifixion of St Andrew, 48in X 62in, was bought to Gosford by Lord Elcho, the tenth Earl of Wemyss, who succeeded in 1883 and was a key figure in building the collection.

It was exhibited at the National Gallery of Scotland in 1957 with other Wemyss works.

"It's an incredibly iconic subject. The provenance is fantastic, from a great collection," said Wentworth Beaumont, a Dickenson director.

"This is a pretty superb picture and in terms of the artist is an exceptional example of his work to come on the market. We anticipate there will be a huge amount of interest in Maastricht." Some public institutions in Scotland had already inquired about the work, he said. An NGS spokeswoman was unable to say yesterday whether the galleries were among them.

Carlo Maratta lived in Rome from 1625-1713. The scene of St Andrew's adoration of the cross was a popular one for 17th-century artists, but Maratta's work is praised for its striking and bold figures and "vigorous energy".

A second version of the painting is held at the Bob Jones University in South Carolina and a smaller one in the Louvre; X-rays of the Wemyss work show the "pentimente", key signs of the artist changing the composition.