Entertainment · Books & Arts · 6 hrs ago
Five Rubens sketches reunite at Gotha museum after decades apart
Five oil sketches by Peter Paul Rubens are together again at the Ducal Museum in Gotha, Germany, for the first time in more than 80 years.
Rubens painted the works in 1620 and 1621 as studies for ceiling paintings in a Jesuit church in Antwerp, which burned down in 1718.
The sketches had been kept at Schloss Friedenstein in Gotha, but all five disappeared by the end of the Second World War; two were returned in 1959.
One sketch was returned by a Buffalo museum in 2024, and another, found in a private US collection, was recently recovered through a private settlement.
The fifth belongs to a Swiss collection and is on loan for the exhibition.
The sketches preserve studies for paintings that no longer exist, and their exhibition also marks the approaching 450th anniversary of Rubens’ birth.
The Gotha exhibition opens on 9 November, with all five works on display together.
Five oil sketches by Peter Paul Rubens are being shown together at Gotha’s Ducal Museum for the first time since they disappeared more than 80 years ago.
The sketches were painted in 1620 and 1621 as studies for ceiling paintings in a Jesuit church in Antwerp.
Three sketches were taken by members of the ducal family and later sold, while two were looted by the Red Army.
One of the three sold sketches returned to Gotha in 2024, and another was recovered through a private settlement.
The fifth sketch is on loan from the Foundation E. G. Bührle Collection in Zurich for the exhibition, which opens on 9 November.
- Who
- Peter Paul Rubens painted the sketches; Gotha’s Ducal Museum is showing them together.
- What
- Five oil sketches depicting saints have reunited for an exhibition.
- When
- The exhibition opens on 9 November 2026.
- Where
- The Ducal Museum in Gotha, Germany.
- Why
- The sketches were studies for ceiling paintings at a Jesuit church in Antwerp. The exhibition also marks the 450th anniversary of Rubens’ birth next year.
This story does not have two clearly opposing sides.
Rubens painted the sketches as preparation for ceiling paintings in the Jesuit church in Antwerp.
The church was hit by lightning and burned down.
All five sketches had disappeared from the collections at Schloss Friedenstein.
Two sketches looted by the Red Army were restituted to Gotha.
A museum in Buffalo returned St. Gregory of Nazianzus with help from Christie’s.
The five sketches are shown together at the Ducal Museum exhibition.
- Number of sketches
- Five oil studies depicting saints
- Artist
- Peter Paul Rubens
- Date painted
- 1620 and 1621
- Original purpose
- Studies for ceiling paintings in a Jesuit church in Antwerp
- Recovered in 2024
- St. Gregory of Nazianzus
- Exhibition venue
- Ducal Museum, Gotha, Germany
What people are saying
No one wanted to criminalise the current owners
It is nothing short of a miracle that Peter Paul Rubens’ five oil studies can now be seen together at the Ducal Museum