The mayor of a French city believes that Madonna might be the owner of a painting that was lost during World War I.
Brigitte Fouré, mayor of Amiens in northern France, is appealing to the pop queen to loan the painting for what she hopes will be Amiens' successful bid to become the European capital of culture in 2028.
"Madonna, you probably haven't heard of Amiens … but there is a special link between you and our city," Fouré said in a video appeal. "This painting is probably a work that was lent to the Amiens museum by the Louvre before the First World War after which we lost trace of it."
The painting, titled "Diana and Endymion," is thought to be by Jérôme-Martin Langlois, according to the Guardian. It was commissioned by Louis XVIII and completed in 1822. The painting was exhibited at the Musée des Beaux-Arts, now the Musée de Picardie, in Amiens from 1878, but it was thought to be destroyed when the city was bombed in 1918.
Then, in 1989, the painting, or an identical copy, appeared in a New York auction, where Madonna bought it for $1.3 million, more than three times the estimated price. At the time no one recognized the work as painted by Langlois, but it drew the attention of a curator in 2015 when it appeared in the background of a photograph published in Paris Match magazine of Madonna at her home.
"I thought it would be a good idea to ask her if we could just borrow this painting that we haven't seen since the First World War," Fouré said in her video appeal. "The painting was sold in a perfectly legal auction; she bought it, and she owns it. I'm not asking her to give it to us, to allow us to borrow it for just a few weeks so people here can see it."
Fouré added that Amiens would welcome a visit from Madonna.
"It would be amazing to have her come here but I can't imagine it happening," she said. "Still, now everyone is talking about Amiens!"
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