Botticelli Painting Under Export Ban Finds a Home at Oxford’s Ashmolean
A 1470s painting by Sandro Botticelli (1445–1510) that had been held back from leaving the United Kingdom will remain on public view in England after its acquisition by the Klesch Collection and a three-year loan to the Ashmolean Museum at the University of Oxford. The work, “The Virgin and Child Enthroned,” had been valued last May at £10.2 million, or about $13.9 million, and had previously sold at Sotheby’s in London for £9.7 million, or $13.2 million.
The arrangement keeps the painting in the country where it has long been part of the art-historical conversation around Renaissance collecting and preservation. For the Ashmolean, the loan adds a major early Botticelli to a museum already known for the breadth of its holdings, from Egyptian antiquities to contemporary art. Xa Sturgis, the museum’s director, said the institution “warmly welcomes this acquisition of a painting by one of the most important artists in the Western tradition, and we’re so pleased that it will remain in the UK. We recognise the value of the Klesch Collection’s commitment to lending works to public institutions.”
Gary Klesch and Anita Klesch collect European art from the 15th through 17th centuries. Their collection began in 2014 with a Giuseppe Arcimboldo painting and has since expanded to include works by Caravaggio, Peter Paul Rubens, Sofonisba Anguissola, and Gerritt Dou. The Botticelli purchase fits squarely within that focus, pairing private stewardship with public access through the Oxford loan.
The painting’s provenance also traces a familiar route through the European market. Harriet Sarah Jones Loyd, Lady Wantage, bought it in 1904 from the Italian dealer Elia Volpi, who had acquired it from the family of Giovanni Magherini Graziani. That layered history, now joined to an export ban and a museum loan, underscores how old master paintings continue to move between private ownership and public display. In this case, the result is unusually clear: a work once at risk of leaving the UK will stay in England, at least for now, where visitors in Oxford will be able to see it in person.
