TEFAF MAASTRICHT 2026

Once again this year, we are proud to present a selection of works that not only represent exciting new discoveries on the market, but also aim to open new avenues for academic research.
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Among the paintings, a highlight is an extraordinary painting on copper by Artemisia Gentileschi, datable to the early 1620s and unseen in public for over thirty years. Recently rediscovered after decades in a private collection, the work represents one of the most refined and fully autograph examples of Artemisia’s extensive production.
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Working in Rome at the same moment - and within the same artistic milieu - was another remarkable woman painter: Virginia Vezzi (or da Vezzo). Celebrated by her contemporaries yet still insufficiently recognised today, she is too often remembered merely as the wife of Simon Vouet. We are therefore particularly proud to present a magnificent Judith with her Maidservant and the Head of Holofernes, a beautifully preserved canvas that represents an important addition to the still-fragmentary corpus of this gifted artist.
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Other paintings in the stand include a delightful unpublished mature work by Giovanni Lanfranco, a refined early still life by Jan Weenix, and a striking Resurrection of Christ by the visionary Lyonnais painter Louis Cretey, whose highly individual style stands among the most eccentric and original expressions of the Baroque.
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Completing the painted selection are a monumental yet intimate Madonna by Giulio Aristide Sartorio and a Belle Époque Portrait by the Tuscan painter Silvio Bicchi, expanding the chronological scope of the stand to include fascinating but still under-recognised Italian artists of the early twentieth century.
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Sculpture is equally prominent this year.
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The rediscovered Elephant in grey marble by Gaetano Monti is undoubtedly one of the highlights of the stand. Executed in the late 18th century after direct observation of a travelling elephant that toured Europe from Asia in the 1770s, the sculpture restores to view both a remarkable artist and the extraordinary story of a living animal that shaped Enlightenment fascination with the exotic.

Another exceptional work is the Cristo Vivo, cast by Antonio Susini from a model by Giambologna, arguably one of the most refined results of their celebrated collaboration around 1590–1609. Surviving in only a handful of casts and executed with extraordinary jewel-like precision, the bronze represents one of the rarest and most accomplished devotional compositions produced within Giambologna’s workshop.
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Equally remarkable is a rediscovered marble Crucifix by Prospero Clemente, datable to around the 1570s. Marble crucifixes are extraordinarily rare due to the technical challenges posed by the medium; aside from the famous example by Benvenuto Cellini now in the Escorial, only a handful were produced during the entire sixteenth century, making this work an exceptional survival.
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The sculptural selection is completed by a lively Bacchus in terracotta by Giacomo De Maria, reflecting the elegant transition from Rococo to Neoclassicism in Emilian sculpture, and by an eccentric and technically dazzling satirical portrait in terracotta by Prosper d’Epinay, exhibited at the 1909 Salon des Humoristes in Paris.
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Together these works form a journey across periods, media and artistic traditions - from Renaissance sculpture to Baroque painting and Belle Époque portraiture - united by a shared ambition: to rediscover forgotten masterpieces and to bring them back into the broader narrative of European art.