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Is our interest in Old Masters waning or is the issue a lack of imagination? Five experts weigh in.

Amid dwindling interest and low supply of top masterpieces, the category is experimenting with new narratives, and even new dates.

Portrait of Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, by Anthony Van Dyck Courtesy of Christie's Having a portrait of someone whose execution you have ordered hanging on your wall might make one feel a little, well, uncomfortable. And so it seems was the case with Charles I and this arresting portrait of Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford (around 1639-40) by Anthony Van Dyck which is coming up for sale at Christie's Old Masters evening auction in London on 8 July, estimated at £3m to £5m. Strafford was a controversial and uncompromising character. Initially a parlia...

Domenico Ghirlandaio's Salvator Mundi Courtesy of Christie's New auction records were set for the Florentine Renaissance painter Domenico Ghirlandaio and the Dutch Golden Age artist Jan de Heem tonight at Christie's Old Masters evening sale in London. Both were in filthy—though not bad—condition, but being fresh to the market they proved very attractive to bidders. Ghirlandaio's recently rediscovered Salvator Mundi blitzed the previous record for a work by the 15th-century painter ($154,250 for Madonna and Child with Adoring Angels at Sotheby's New York, 2001) sellin...

Jacob van Ruisdael’s ‘The Hekelveld’, in Amsterdam in Winter (around 1665-70), is in Agnews’ London Art Week exhibition, Landscapes and Cityscapes, from the 17th to 20th century Courtesy of Agnews The contemporary art market yo-yos with the stock markets and whims of speculators, the auction results of its young stars shoehorned into indexes that dress them up as investment material. But Old Masters are a more capricious beast. This is not a constructible market with a continuous supply from malleable young artists; instead, there are fallow years, offering only du...