St Augustine

Acquired by duke Ernest II of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg in 1802 from Francois Xavier de Burtin, Brussels (cf. file 126); in the Kunstkammer before 1826. […]. 1935 in the Duke's Museum, Oberlichtsaal 2 (file 3405); 1943 in Reinhardsbrunn (catalog 1943, sheet 45); the picture belonged to the 5 oil sketches by Rubens, which had been transferred to Coburg (according to the transfer protocol in March 1945) and did not come back from there to Gotha. During a visit to the Rubens exhibition in Antwerp in 1977, the former director discovered one of the oil sketches of Rubens 'St. Augustine' that had been missing from Gotha since 1945. The owner of the oil sketches was indicated in the exhibition as the Foundation Collection E.G. Bührle, Zurich. Bührle bought the sketch in 1953 from a Zurich art dealer, who in turn had acquired the sketch in New York (since 1952 in the E. & A. Silberman Galleries). A claim for surrender of the painting by Gotha was rejected in 1977 by Emil Blättler, who represented the foundation as a lawyer. According to information from Mrs. Schuttwolf, Gotha this oil sketch is today presumably in the USA (July 31, 1997).