Swansea Britain's Lost Masterpieces

'Britain's major galleries house some of the finest collections

'of art to be found anywhere in the world.

'But there are thousands of other artworks we know little about,

'in the collections of smaller institutions, government offices,

'local museums and country houses.

'Many of them unrecorded and unknown.

'But over 80% of this treasure trove remains locked away in storage.

'Lost in this limbo, even works by the biggest names in art

'can fall into obscurity.

'The Art UK website was created to shine a light into these shadows,

'and now has over 200,000 paintings online.'

Using this database, we'll be travelling the country,

seeking out potential lost masterpieces

lying unrecognised and unregarded in dusty corridors and storerooms.

When we find a promising painting we'll attempt to uncover its hidden

history and true brilliance through a meticulous process of restoration,

research and scientific analysis.

We'll also investigate the stories of how these works made their way

into our public collections and what they tell us

about where we come from and who we are.

But finding a painting is just the beginning of the trail.

# Mae hen wlad fy nhadau

# Yn annwyl i mi... #

'Swansea was once a powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution,

'when its smelting works earned it the nickname Copperopolis.

'At one point in the 19th century, 90% of the world's copper ore

'was brought here to be processed.

'And the remnants of this heritage are visible everywhere in the city.'

# Dros rhyddid collasant... #

'Today, this former rolling mill in Swansea Harbour

'serves as the storeroom of the Swansea Museum.

'And what a storeroom.

'The museum began life in 1841 as the Royal Institute of South Wales.

'It's been accumulating items of local interest ever since.

'Garethe El Tawab is the current custodian of this fascinating collection

'of flotsam and jetsam.'

Wow, this is the most bonkers museum store I think I've ever seen,

-anywhere in the world.

-Well, I think we've got a bit of...

Well, definitely something for everyone.

The collections go back to the 1830s, so we're the oldest museum in Wales.

They come from private donations and things that have been bought

for the collections over the years.

So, yes, a bit of everything.

'Bendor is champing at the bit to explore the museum's picture store.

'But to try and make sense of this colossal cornucopia of clutter,

'I opt for a guided tour with Garethe.'

Tell me a bit more about how all of these weird and wonderful objects

came together in one collection.

That's what's unusual, I think, isn't it?

Well, the sort of early collections were sort of

objects from all over the world that were just collected by private

individuals and donated to the Royal Institute of South Wales,

so became part of their collection.

And then, I suppose, collections policies came in

and since it's been in the ownership of the City and County of Swansea.

But we also collect a lot of social history to do with people's lives today.

So are you constantly on the lookout for things that might...

-Yes.

-..build the collection?

We get contacted by colleagues in other departments

within the Council. "Oh, we're just demolishing this,

"would you like to come and take these things out before it hits the ground?"

It is truly the most eclectic collection I've ever seen.

Yes, and obviously things like this we wouldn't collect today.

No, I imagine not.

That came in Victorian times into the collection.

It's a bit sad now because they were on open display for years,

people stroked them, and they've gone bald, basically.

'I'm really staggered by the sheer amount of local ephemera

'on the shelves.

'Aladdin's Cave had nothing on this place.'

Putting you through...

Swansea is probably best known today as the place that issues our driving licences.

But back in its industrial heyday it was a booming town

whose wealth came directly out of the ground.

'Swansea became Copperopolis because of a simple equation.

'It takes four tonnes of coal to smelt one tonne of copper.

'So it was more efficient to bring the copper ore to the Swansea coalfields.

'Initially the ore came from Cornwall,

'but eventually from all over the world.

'The practice of covering a ship's hull in copper - copper bottoming -

'was developed in Swansea.

'It increased the vessel's manoeuvrability,

'which Nelson claimed contributed to his victory at Trafalgar.'

The Victorian industrialists who founded the Royal Institute

were fired by a civic pride in their rapidly expanding town.

They were avid collectors of curiosities from across the globe,

things like these wonderful Roman mosaics

and this dervish sword from the deserts of East Africa.

'But, today, everything means something to someone,

'and it's a challenge to decide what to keep and what to display.'

That wasn't something that greatly troubled the founders of the Royal Institution,

like Major George Grant Francis here.

They had a sense of certainty in what people should find in a museum.

And in 1841 they opened their doors to the public with something

which had never taken place in Wales before -

an exhibition of fine art.

'The pictures in the Swansea stores today are, I'm sure,

'all of some value as historical artefacts.

'But there are not many you might describe as fine art.

'There is, however, one I found on the Art UK website that might just

'fall into that category.

'It's not that one.

'And it's definitely not that one.

'Ah, this is what we're looking for.'

When I saw a photograph of this picture online,

it was described simply as a picture by an unknown artist.

But I thought it reminded me of the work of one of the giants

of 17th-century Flemish painting, Jacob Jordaens.

He was a pupil of Rubens and went on to dominate painting in Antwerp

in the mid-17th century.

I have to say, looking at the painting now,

in the flesh for the first time,

I think, blimey, what was I thinking?

Because it's difficult not to be distracted by the sheer state of it.

It's on...one, two, three, four, five disjointed planks of wood.

And there are some truly awful bits of painting.

I mean, this dog here looks like it's been stuck on in a paper cutout

and painted in the most extraordinary sort of pinky-brown.

There's a horse up here which has been sort of trimmed in pink.

It looks like something out of My Little Pony.

Hardly the work of a great master,

but if you spend some time with the picture and look more closely at it

then signs of artistic genius, I think, begin to emerge.

Although this dog is terrible,

the one next to it is absolutely marvellous.

These two dogs here are painted very quickly and very confidently.

They're looking up at their master, I presume, with that sort of

sense of loyal patience that you get in a dog.

I think there are some extraordinary passages of painting in here.

It feels to me that

there is a great painting fighting to come out.

'We carry the panel into the central space to get a clearer view of it

'and I start to feel a little more optimistic,

'despite its dilapidated condition.'

-On the chair?

-Yeah.

'We found an old bus seat to serve as an easel.'

So the subject is Atalanta and Meleager,

but my classical mythology is rubbish,

do you know what's going on in this?

Well, a little. They've just been involved in a hunt to kill

this wild boar that's been ravaging the countryside.

-Hence the hunting dogs, I guess.

-Hence the hunting dogs.

But actually, it's the woman, it's Atalanta who first...

..gives him a mortal wound.

And then Meleager comes in and finishes him off.

A lot of the men get very, very annoyed

that a woman was involved in the hunt in the first place,

and that then she is being presented with the prize of the boar.

I think what happens next is that Meleager, to sort of defend

his lover, Atalanta, starts attacking people.

He kills four or five people.

This is Greek sexism in action.

It certainly is, in a big way.

I probably have chosen the most damaged picture in here to show you.

-Yes.

-Not a picture in great condition, this.

And I think what's really interesting about it is

there's so many... Do you see these really rubbish bits?

That sort of horrible pink that's just slapped on there.

Yeah, that doesn't look good.

Look at the background, you see that sort of solid blue slab of paint?

-So, why do you think we're seeing that?

-I'm hoping...

HE LAUGHS

I reckon and I'm hoping this is all a case of the restorer from hell.

Someone has come along and thought they're helping this picture,

but actually they're just covering it with rubbish layers of overpaint.

Now, I can see why you might have picked this.

There's a lot of interest here, it's just...it looks a mess.

I know. The question is, can we fix it?

And here is a lovely label.

"Copy with variations of Meleager and Atalanta by Jacob Jordaens

-"in the Prado, Madrid."

-Ah.

Probably early 18th century.

Early 18th century?

Well, I don't think that's right.

The copyist has followed the Flemish handling of the original

very faithfully and is so self-effacing

as to be impossible to identify.

Well...

But you're not convinced by that?

What's your hunch, then?

I don't know. You may think I'm bonkers having seen this wreck,

but I think this is not by an 18th-century copyist.

I think it's...

possibly by Jordaens himself.

My suspicion is that this could be a study,

so it could be his first working-out for that subject.

For the picture in the Prado?

Yeah, yeah. Which makes it tremendously important

and tremendously valuable.

'This picture seems to be a very long way from home,

'and it would be a terrific help to know when it arrived in the collection.

'But Swansea Museum has had a chequered history

'and the records are incomplete.

'But on the off chance that there is a mention,

'I volunteer to do the first shift.'

'As investors in what were then hi-tech industries,

'the businessmen and industrialists who founded the Swansea Museum

'were motivated by the latest developments in science

'and were granted a Royal Charter for their research.

'It was the very first museum in Wales,

'with exhibition rooms, a library and laboratory,

'all contained in a fashionable neo-Egyptian building.'

Originally there was a tennis court on the front lawn,

but it had to be closed because of inebriated spectators.

'It's interesting that the museum was primarily a scientific institution

'but its opening exhibition should have been of paintings.

'There's a great piece of high-minded Victorianism

'from the founding proposal.

'It would "foster a taste for a better knowledge of the fine arts

'"among all classes and administer direct gratification

'"to many cultivated minds".'

Other highlights from the museum's history include a stuffed elephant,

which died whilst a circus was in town.

It was gifted to the museum, where, for a while,

it became one of the most popular exhibits.

MUSIC: Guide Me O Thou Great Redeemer

'"Direct gratification to cultivated minds"

'is still part of the purpose of the museum.

'Although, today, as well as celebrating the great and good

'who founded the institution,

'it also honours the muck and sweat on which the town's industrial success was built.'

'Bendor and I are getting a peek behind the scenes of an exhibition

'by one of the greatest painters of Welsh Valley life, who I feel

'is in danger of being overlooked by art history.'

So there's something that I wanted to show you, completely different,

in a way, from what we've been looking at.

'This is a sextych -

'a picture made up of six panels - by the Polish artist Josef Herman.

'Due to its size, it's quite rare for it to be on display,

'so this is a huge treat for me.

'Knowing Bendor's love of old brown paintings,

'I wonder if I can tickle his fancy with a modern brown painting?'

It's very brown, isn't it?

It is very brown, but that's interesting.

One of the things he did was that he underpainted in very,

very light colours and then built up darker layers on top because he

wanted to get his figures, all of these big monolithic figures,

to look as though the light was sort of emanating from within.

Of course, it's figurative, but it's incredibly abstracted.

You know, these faces look very totemic and masklike.

I love these huge hands as well, look at that.

Those enormous sausagey fingers of labour.

These are not pretty hands.

You're making a very good case for this picture.

I'm nearly sold. SHE LAUGHS

But, actually, he was really interested in the old masters.

Flemish artists, Dutch artists, northern Italian artists,

so actually, the leap from our possible Jordaens

is not as far as you might imagine.

I feel a bit more comfortable now,

admiring this great masterpiece of post-war Welsh-Polish painting.

-Is that what we call it?

-Maybe Polish-Welsh?

Polish-Welsh, OK.

'Whichever way round you join these two nations,

'I can't help feeling puzzled by what it was that drew Josef Herman

'from Warsaw all the way to the Welsh Valleys.

'Herman was a Polish Jew who left his homeland in 1938

'to escape rising anti-Semitism,

'but also to pursue his ambitions as an artist.

'As his train left Warsaw, his mother leaned against the window

'and told him, "Never, never come back."

'He wandered through Belgium,

'visiting art galleries and discovering modern painting.

'This opened a world of creative possibilities to him.

'But as a refugee on the run, he was unable to explore his new ideas.

'When he reached Britain he received the terrible news from the Red Cross

'that his family had been murdered by the Nazis in the Holocaust.

'The 11 years he was to spend in Wales became a period of healing,

'and these panels -

'commissioned for the Welsh pavilion at the Festival of Britain -

'were his masterpiece.'

For me, this is the flipside of the story of the Valleys,

because the men who built this institution had great ideas,

but their ideas were only possible to put into practice

because of the incredibly hard graft of men like this.

The men who actually went down the pits and dug the coal,

on the basis of which the wealth of Swansea was built.

So, for me, this is a really heroic picture.

These are heroic men who should be celebrated every bit as much as

the patrons and the benefactors.

'The big question is how a Warsaw art student

'finally found recognition painting miners in the Welsh Valleys.

'But we have an even older mystery to unpick.

'The dilapidated panel of Meleager and Atalanta doesn't seem to fit

'any of the known facts about Jacob Jordaens.

'But before we can begin to work out who painted it,

'we need to get a proper look under the grime and overpaint.

'Bond Street - the heartbeat of London's art market.

'Swansea Museum have kindly allowed us to bring their panel

'to the studio of picture restoration wizard Simon Gillespie,

'who is helping us unlock the puzzles hidden in all our pictures.

'With a battery of modern scientific tools, but most importantly

'an expert eye and a forensic touch, Simon will help find the evidence

'that will tell us what our paintings really are.'

This is an enormous amount of overpaint.

It's rather alarming because if that is really necessary,

then there's a problem.

But we should have a look.

There we go. Look at that.

The original's colour here

is very well worth looking at.

That little bit in there is the original.

That is the ghastly, horrible overpaint.

Oh, I see. So under the horse's mouth,

that very pale blue is the original sky colour and then we've got

-horrid, lurid blue there...

-Which is overpaint.

Which is all over that background.

-So, in other words...

-And also, there's dirt as well.

Lots of dirt. But in other words it looks like all this overpaint

could possibly just be cosmetic,

-where someone has tried to make a sketch...

-Yeah.

-..look...

-More substantial, yeah.

-..more like a finished picture.

-Yeah.

What is this sort of, like, treacly dribble here?

Treacl...

It's sort of a thick varnish that's been applied on the top.

-And just left to run down?

-Just left to run down,

it's a ridiculous thing to have done.

-God.

-Well, if the same man who did this overpaint has done that,

it's a very silly thing.

He should be had up for crimes against conservation.

Yes, I don't know what we'd do with him, really.

We'd probably overpaint him.

Murder by overpainting! Death by overpaint.

'So to recap, it's filthy,

'there are thick layers of clumsily applied varnish

'and there are significant areas of heavy overpainting.

'Fortunately, Simon enjoys a challenge.'

Immediately you can see the overpaint fluorescing.

'This is where the real magic of our detection takes place.

'Even removing a simple layer of dust can reveal new clues.

'Gradually, as the dust comes away,

'it's as if we're able to travel back hundreds of years

'and look over the shoulder of the artist as he painted.'

This is like wetting a pebble on the beach,

you suddenly get all the colours and depth inside the stone.

So, for the first time now...

-Yes, look.

-..we can see the body of the dog.

Very nice. Look, these little flashes of colour are hidden away

in there. I mean, this is somebody...

You can see through here,

look, these wonderful confident brushstrokes.

And it's in really lovely condition as well.

That's really exciting to see that.

I think we should give our overpainting friend a name.

And in honour of Swansea's other most famous son,

I'm going to call him Dylan. Dylan Thomas.

Dylan the overpainter.

Dylan the overpainter.

-Dastardly Dylan.

-Dastardly Dylan, yes.

'The various bottles on Simon's trolley

'are bespoke mixtures of alchemical solutions.

'A watery concoction to remove dust,

'or a more powerful one to attack the overpaint.

'It seems there's hardly an area of the picture

'that hasn't suffered from Dylan's attentions.

'The horseman's sword is completely different to the original.

'Atalanta has been given a new red frock

'and even her rosy nipple is a later embellishment.

'Simon's first efforts have confirmed that under the dust,

'dirt and overpaint, we can see the hand of a very fine painter.

'But they also throw up some knotty questions -

'what exactly are we dealing with here?'

According to the note on the back of this picture, Simon,

it's supposed to be a copy of this painting in the Prado.

A much bigger oil-on-canvas version of Meleager and Atalanta.

If the artist was making a copy of this, they would have applied a much

thicker paint. This is actually painted rather like a watercolour.

-Yes.

-Very thinly applied washes,

-very confidently blocking out or sketching in...

-Yeah.

-..the idea.

-It looks as if it's not intended to be seen as a finished

-painting.

-Absolutely. Yeah.

-Yeah.

But there is a problem here, because according to this catalogue entry,

the Prado picture was made in two stages.

First one circa 1620-1623

but then it was enlarged with the addition of this other half

in about 1640.

'The experts claim the left-hand half of the painting

'was an addition made 20 years later.

'But - and this is a big but -'

'..if the Swansea panel was made before the Prado picture,

'then it must surely be a sketch by Jordaens himself,

'and the Prado picture must have been painted in one go.

'I think it's time to plunge into the world Jordaens was painting in.

'We need to find out more about his technique

'and whether sketches like our panel

'were part of his normal working practice.

'In the early years of the 17th century, Antwerp was experiencing

'an economic and cultural boom.

'Jordaens was born in the city in 1593

'and became a pupil of Peter Paul Rubens.

'And, for a time, worked alongside Anthony van Dyck.

'The city became one of the most creative in the world

'and could comfortably support these three giants of the Flemish Baroque.'

'Rubens' house and workshop,

'which were an inspiration for Jordaens' similar set-up,

'have survived pretty much intact.'

This is Rubens' studio.

For me, it's the birthplace of some of the greatest works of art

the world has ever seen.

You might think it's quite a large space for one artist to work in,

but in the early 17th century it would have been packed full

of pupils and assistants working on a whole number of different pictures

under the guidance of the master himself.

And it's very likely that one of those was Jordaens.

'Today, Rubens' house is a museum, and it contains self-portraits

'of both Rubens and Jordaens.

'They tell us a lot about how each man saw himself.'

Here's Rubens, international jet-set painter and diplomat.

Friend of royalty.

Looking suave and confident with his whiskers waxed

and his hat cocked at a jaunty angle.

And here's our man, Jordaens.

The local lad who looks like he's had a few beers

and thinks we'd all like to hear just how clever he is on the bagpipes.

Well, that's certainly how the history books

have described the two men, but are they right?

Well, it's the inevitable fate of everyone working in Antwerp

in the first part of the 17th century.

I mean, Rubens was a giant, a genius.

Van Dyck came close, but he was, at the end of the day, the lesser genius,

and then there was Jordaens, you know, the bronze medal, so to speak.

But I can see Jordaens, certainly the Jordaens...the early Jordaens,

working between, say, 1615-1645 roughly,

as really a great, great master.

'If our panel was a preliminary sketch, or a modello,

'as the art jargon has it,

'I wondered if this was common working practice in Antwerp

'at the time.'

They were used as models - "modelli" in Italian -...

..to be presented to the patron,

the person who commissioned the painting,

but also they could be,

or can be considered as tryouts in which the artist seeks to find

a proper... the most exciting compositions.

They played a vital part in Flemish studio practice.

So when someone presents a possible Jordaens picture to you,

what are you looking for? What do you see that makes you think,

"Aha! This is by Jordaens"?

The sketching, the fluidity of the brushwork,

the colour, all that is...

all those elements make it into a Jordaens.

'Jordaens' reputation has never been as high as that of Rubens.

'He was not from the city's elite

'and is felt to have been much more comfortable depicting the rougher

'pleasures of life, because he understood them himself.

'His talent for finely observed detail is evident

'in the rough-and-tumble drunken fun of The King Drinks, here.

'And we see the same skill in the way he captures the behaviour

'of the dogs in the Swansea panel.

'But this was not the limit of his artistic abilities.

'He was also a careful craftsman

'whose pictures show a great amount of thought.

'And if the Swansea panel is a preparatory sketch,

'it would confirm how much planning he put into his compositions.

'Jordaens was certainly a popular success,

'and kept himself in fine style.

'This was his home and studio.'

When he was 25, he was earning enough to buy this house,

and with a few additions and extensions

it would remain his home for the rest of his life.

'Unlike his more famous contemporaries,

'Jordaens never felt any urge to leave Antwerp.

'And this may have contributed to his reputation

'as a less sophisticated painter.

'While van Dyck was a bit of an Anglophile and ended up in London,

'and Rubens toured the royal courts of Europe as a diplomat -

'some might even say spy -

'Jordaens, it seems, was happy in his hometown.

'But though he was less well travelled,

'I think his mythological pictures are every bit

'as intellectually considered as Rubens'.

'There's a popular tradition in Flemish painting

'of busy genre scenes, showing the everyday lives of people

'going about their daily chores.

'And Jordaens' boozy pictures show he loved this kind of painting.

'But grander mythological subjects

'not only sold like hot cakes to the city's bourgeoisie,

'they were also an opportunity for a painter to advertise his own learning.

'Antwerp was a progressive city, the cradle of the Northern Renaissance,

'and its wealthy merchants wanted to feel part of the intellectual life

'of the city.

'Commissioning art showing scenes from classical myths and legends

'was one way to do this.

'Typical of Antwerp's chattering classes was a lawyer

'called Nicolaas Rockox, whose home survives as a museum.

'This was the sort of place where the city's intelligentsia

'would have met to discuss the classics,

'like the Roman poet Ovid, whose Metamorphoses

'was the source of the myth of Meleager and Atalanta.

'Their imaginations would have been fired by the paintings on the walls,

'showing scenes from the legends.

'The story of Atalanta and Meleager hunting the boar

'was a staple subject of these works.

'This example by Rubens from 1616 is just one of many.'

They were mad for Ovid in early-17th-century Antwerp.

And this version by Jordaens was painted around 1617,

a year or so after Rubens' picture and just as Jordaens was starting

to find success as an independent artist.

'Several new translations of Ovid's Metamorphoses were published

'at this time. Each one inspiring painters to pick a different moment

'in the story to ramp up the action.'

The myth tells of a rampaging boar

that had been destroying the vineyards of the King.

His son, Meleager,

is tasked with rounding up the greatest hunters in the kingdom

to catch the boar. Including the fearsome female warrior, Atalanta,

with whom he's in love.

And it's she, rather than any of the men, who strikes the first blow.

To honour her, Meleager presents her with the boar's head as a trophy.

'Some of the other hunters were jealous

'that a woman would be honoured in this way,

'and try to take the boar's head back.

'Meleager draws his sword, and in the bloodbath that ensues

'our hero and several of his close relatives end up dead.

'So, what's the moral we're supposed to take away here?

'Not to act on impulsive anger.

'But is there something else Jordaens has in mind?'

This is the battle between reason and passion.

Between a vigorous youth and his aged forefathers.

In that sense, it might even be a vision of Jordaens himself.

Carving a new, independent voice in the face of the older,

more experienced Rubens.

'So, what have we found out about Jordaens from our Antwerp visit?

'And where does our Swansea picture fit into the story?'

It seems to me you can make a case for him actually being a really

intellectual thinker about how to put classical subjects

in paint form.

He's evolving Rubens' very consciously classical figures

into something a little bit more interesting

in terms of the story of the subject matter.

I love the way in Jordaens' version, our Atalanta is not this gorgeous

elevated goddess of mythology,

she's a kind of ruddy-faced Antwerp woman...

-Yes.

-..who might have been wandering the streets outside his house

-that very morning.

-Yes.

You get that sense of real life colliding with high art.

I love that mix of high and low.

That seems to be really uniquely Jordaens.

Yes, that's very interesting.

And he was obviously someone who wanted to explore the story

of Atalanta and Meleager a great deal more,

because then a few years later, with this picture in the Prado,

he completely reinvents the whole scene.

I'm hoping and I think that our picture from Swansea

is the bridge between Jordaens' early efforts

of Atalanta and Meleager in the Rockox house, and then...

..you come to the finished picture in the Prado.

The more famous one. I think our picture is actually going to be

quite crucial in helping us to sort of

cast a new light on Jordaens' early career.

But the problem we have is that according to all the Jordaens scholars

from about the last century,

they are convinced that that picture in the Prado was painted

in two halves, 20 years apart.

That would undermine our idea that Jordaens was someone

who was thinking quite deeply about these classical subjects.

So it is our mission

to rehabilitate Jordaens through this painting in Swansea.

So I want to go and have a look at it in person, actually,

and try and get to the bottom of what's going on there.

So off to Madrid you go.

-Off to Madrid.

-In the meantime, I've got a slightly different sort of

journey and discovery in mind.

-So I'm heading back to the Valleys of Wales.

-Right.

It's thrilling to think that our panel might be a lost masterpiece,

but it's important not to forget where we found the picture

and what it might mean to Swansea.

'I'm taking the bus into the Valleys to recreate a journey

'that was made by Josef Herman,

'whose monumental mining painting we saw at the museum.

'His destination,

'at the foot of the mountain Craig y Farteg, was the mining village

'of Ystradgynlais.

'When Josef Herman arrived here in 1944

'he was still deeply traumatised by the loss of his family in the Holocaust.

'He later described feeling a void of inner emptiness.

'He'd planned to visit for a few days, but he stayed for 11 years.'

What was it about a small mining village in the Brecons

that had such a profound appeal to a Polish-Jewish refugee?

'For me, this is something of a personal pilgrimage.

'I've always loved Herman's work,

'but until now I've never visited the Welsh Valleys that inspired him.

'The main street of Ystradgynlais,

'with its stone cottages regularly interspersed with Nonconformist chapels,

'isn't noticeably different from many other pit villages,

'but something happened here that afternoon that made him decide to stay.'

As he took in the local scene from this bridge,

a group of miners suddenly appeared.

They stopped and chatted

and their bodies were silhouetted against the setting sun.

In that instant - the seminal moment of Herman's creative life -

he knew that he'd found a fresh subject,

and a renewed sense of purpose for his art.

'Ystradgynlais,

'set in a fold in the Brecon Beacons and surrounded by coal mines,

'became his adopted home.

'And the miners his inspiration.

'At first he stayed here, at the Penybont Inn,

'in a large room above the bar known as the ballroom.

'This was his window.

'In Josef's diary, he relates how he would wake up to the sound of

'the miners' hobnailed boots on the cobbles

'as they walked to work in the dark.

'When he lifted the curtain aside to watch,

'they would give him a friendly wave.'

He quickly developed a fluent style,

working with charcoal and black ink

and creating a palette and texture for his work

that perfectly mirrored that thick layer of coal dust

that coated his subjects.

Eventually, after two years of sketching,

he at last felt confident enough to paint.

'In order to better understand the lives of these men,

'Herman began to go down the mines to sketch the backbreaking work

'in progress, sharing the discomfort and the risk.'

My painting,

which is something I enjoy more than anything else in life...

..is, at heart, serious.

When all is said and done,

I am more interested in moral than in aesthetic values.

'His moral values were moulded by a strongly left-wing political outlook,

'and he certainly found a kindred spirit in the mining communities.

'But at the same time as he became established as a painter,

'he began to make contact with galleries in London.

'After six years of wandering Europe with a bad case of creative block,

'Wales became a place of healing.

'At this point, with the help of new friend Dai Williams,

'he converted a small factory building into a place to live and work.

'Today, it's home to Dai's niece, Betty.'

He referred often to the ease of the acceptance,

how easily and quickly he was accepted by the people.

Within a few days, they had affectionately called him Joe Bach.

He was known as Joe Bach forever.

What does "bach" mean in Welsh?

"Bach" is really small.

But it is an affectionate term.

You know, when we say "bach", we mean it in a friendly way.

Yes.

I think that he saw some similarities with his...

..with his homeland as well.

With working-class...

..the devout chapel-goers

with his devout grandparents to the synagogue,

the two languages of Yiddish and Polish and English and Welsh.

He loved, when he stayed at the Penybont,

just to come down to the bar and to discuss politics and economics

with the miners in the bar at the Penybont.

'Josef Herman is still remembered fondly in the bar of the Penybont Inn.'

That's a fantastic photograph, isn't it?

Let's have a look.

'Former miner Viv has a photograph of the villagers as they prepared

'for the 1951 Festival of Britain.'

-Joe Bach is there.

-There he is, at the edge.

Why do you think he was so interested in the miners?

Well, put it this way, it wasn't easy work,

and he had a lot of respect for the miners, you know.

He went through a lot himself to get here, you know.

I think he appreciated...

..what we were doing for Britain,

relatively speaking.

It sounds like his politics were very similar to a lot of people here

-as well.

-Oh, yes. The working class.

-And very radical and left-wing.

-He was very close to the working class, you know.

He went up to London and...

..hobnobbing about with the bigwigs, like, you know!

But, still, I think his heart remained with the working class.

'The mining industry that was such an inspiration to Herman has gone.

'There were six pits surrounding the village, all of which have closed.

'But some of the machinery from Cefn Coed Colliery

'is preserved as a museum.

'Impressive as it is,

'it wasn't the mechanisation that inspired Josef Herman.

'His art is solely focused on the human toil

'in this most challenging environment.'

He was a refugee, an orphan from the storms of the 20th century,

but he did find peace here in the end,

as well as acceptance by the Welsh people.

So much so that his huge miners mural represented Wales

at the Festival of Britain in 1951.

'It was this painting that cemented his reputation in Britain.

'His work now hangs in many collections, including the Tate,

'and he received an OBE in 1981 for services to British art.

'Yet he never forgot his ties to the people of the Valleys.

'For Herman, the mountain Craig y Farteg loomed large,

'a physical manifestation of the work of the miners

'and the life of the community.

'He, perhaps, put it best himself.

'"I don't have to explain myself to these people, they already know."

'Today is a big day for our Jordaens investigation.

'I'm going to see the full-sized painting

'for which we think our panel is a study.

'It has had an interesting life since it left his studio.

'For a while, it hung over the bed of the Queen of Spain,

'in the Royal Palace of La Granja de San Ildefonso.

'But these days, it's in the collection of the Prado Museum

'in Madrid.

'There's no doubt that the picture has been painted on two strips

'of canvas joined together.

'You can see the seam quite clearly.

'It's when they were painted that's the key question in our investigation.'

So the theory is that Jordaens painted this picture in two halves.

He painted the half on the right in about 1620

and then 20 years later he painted these figures here.

But I just don't buy it.

'Accepted wisdom says that these characters on the left

'are painted in a later style,

'softer and more muted than Meleager and Atalanta.

'But I think this is entirely intentional

'and is done to accentuate the drama of the picture.'

Here, Jordaens has turned himself into a stage director,

and in order to make sure your eye - the viewer's eye -

goes straight to the important bit of the story,

he's lit them more strongly and there's less light on these people.

So your eye goes to the heart of the action.

And you're drawn

to not only the gaze between Atalanta and Meleager,

but also her hand here, which is the key part of the story.

Where she's trying to stop him from drawing his sword

and causing further bloodshed and violence.

If I'm right, if this picture was painted all at once,

then suddenly that allows the possibility

that the painting in Swansea is not a copy, but a preparatory study.

Because it doesn't make much sense for a copyist to see a picture

by Jordaens and then decide, "I'm going to add in some extra figures."

But if you accept the painting in Swansea as a study for this picture,

then it all begins to fall into place and you can see why

some of the figures might have been taken out in order to fit

the subject onto the composition we have here.

And it's interesting to notice some of the differences.

The most important one, I think,

is we no longer have that mad-looking horseman

in the centre of the canvas

who was about to chop off Meleager's head.

He's gone.

And then my favourites change, actually,

is up here at the boar's head.

In the painting in Swansea, the boar is very dead,

and his eye is closed. But here, it's open,

and it's almost as if he's been brought back to life a bit.

'He's staring down on the action with a knowing look,

'as if to say, "You may have killed me,

'"but the game's up for you lot in a minute."

'Having got up close and personal with this picture,

'I now feel more certain than ever that Jordaens painted it in one go.

'I can't see anything here to support the idea that he added

'the left-hand section at a later date.

'But, if that is the case,

'then how do we explain the join down the middle of the canvas?

'I think I may have found something to help us out on that point.'

I've been doing a bit of digging here about the artist's materials

that would have been available in Antwerp

at the beginning of the 17th century.

And it looks like one of the standard widths for canvas

was 120 centimetres.

'This is from the inventory of a shop in Rotterdam

'that dealt with suppliers in Antwerp in the 17th century.

'You can see the width they were supplying was 7/4 ells wide,

'and in today's money that's 120 centimetres.

'The Prado picture is double that - 240 centimetres wide.'

So what that means is that Jordaens, in order to make a bigger picture,

would have had to stitch together two standard widths of canvas.

'Could that account for the seam running down the centre of the Prado painting?

'This new information is very convincing.

'But can we actually prove it?

'If Jordaens did make paintings from two sections of canvas

'simply because that was what a dealer sold,

'then we should see the same phenomena on other large paintings

'from the same period.

'The Brussels Museum of Fine Art

'has a Jordaens painting of an identical width

'to the Prado picture, and made shortly afterwards.

'Most significantly, it too is made of two strips of canvas.'

You can very clearly see the seam down the middle of this picture

where the two bits of canvas were joined together.

But no-one has ever suggested that this composition was made

in two halves at two different times.

It simply wouldn't make any sense if it had been, because the line goes

straight through the middle of the lady's head up here,

and it would also chop this lady's fingers off.

She would have a mutilated hand.

So, clearly, this painting was conceived all at once.

And the reason that this picture is so crucial to our case is because

we have a preparatory drawing that relates to it

and it shows exactly what Jordaens was thinking

when he was making pictures like this.

This drawing shows us Jordaens' first idea for the painting

behind me. You can see that there were originally more figures

in the picture, and also it was wider - there was more space.

And Jordaens, in the finished picture,

has taken away this space here, the figures are closer together.

And he's deleted this character and this character,

which you don't see in the middle of the painting.

It feels like he's sort of

tightened the focus on the composition a little bit more.

And I think you can see exactly the same creative process

in the relationship between our study from Swansea

and the finished picture in the Prado.

The focus has been tightened again

and the composition has been narrowed and squeezed in a bit.

Suddenly we can see how all of Jordaens' Atalanta and Meleager

pictures fit together. I think they were all painted

in a fairly condensed period from about 1616 to 1620.

'In each iteration of the myth, he subtly plays with the action.

'Refining his ideas to present the most intense,

'emotional moment in the story.'

So, Jordaens wasn't the slapdash painter of classical scenes

that he's been made out to be. He really thought things through.

He was meticulous.

'Back in Bond Street,

'restoration proceeds apace on our Swansea painting.

'Simon and his team are coaxing the warped cedar planks of the panel

'back into one harmonious whole,

'using a series of techniques that are centuries old.

'It involves some delicate clamping

'and the use of an old glue recipe made from rabbit hide.

'Having not seen any of the restoration work until now,

'I would have to say the results look pretty spectacular

'and a world away from the grubby set of planks

'you could shine a torch through back in the Swansea warehouse.'

I'm very pleased about the panel and the way it's come together.

It's got this natural bow to it, which is what happens with wood

when it dries. It dries a lot on the back and it doesn't dry so much

on the front where the paint is, because the paint is holding it firm.

And so it shrinks on the back and therefore you get this curve.

'Even the back of the panel is looking good.

'And it's here that Simon's made a fresh discovery.'

So this shows it up very clearly.

So, now, what's that?

This is undoubtedly a panel maker's mark.

So that's a specific maker.

Wow.

'But that's not all. There are some more barely legible impressions

'on the back of the panel.'

I've got to be honest, it looks like a slight blob,

-a slight blemish in the wood, to me.

-Somebody's dropped the panel!

It's not a particularly good example, but this is very exciting to see.

So all of this together, actually,

very specifically helps place this panel in time and space.

-Yes, it is extraordinary.

-That's a huge piece of evidence.

A massive amount. It's really good news to see that.

'Simon makes a tracing of these marks for further investigation.

'I'm hoping a trip to the Witt Library at the Courtauld Institute

'in London, armed with Simon's tracing, will prove conclusively

'that our panel is not a later copy.

'This is a compelling piece of evidence for the painting.

'Panel makers' marks are exactly like hallmarks on a piece of gold,

'recording when, where and by whom the panel was made.'

This is one of those fantastic art history books where someone

has done all the hard work and people like me can just come along

and pluck their conclusions.

An art historian called Professor Juergen Wadham has spent decades

cataloguing all of these panel marks that one finds on the back

of panel paintings.

And he's worked out what they mean, and particularly,

what dates they relate to.

There are two key marks on the back of our picture.

The first is the brand of the City of Antwerp,

which panel makers were compelled, by law,

to apply to the back of their panels.

And on the back of our picture we have what's catalogued here as brand

number one, which was only in use between 1617 and 1626.

And the second was the year stamp. In our case, the letter A.

And according to this research,

the conjunction between that City of Antwerp brand and the letter A

means the panel almost certainly was made between 1619 and 1622.

In other words, that is exactly the right date for when we think

Jordaens painted our picture.

'The dating from the panel marks is conclusive proof

'that the painting is not a later copy,

'but it also puts to the sword the notion that the Prado picture

'was made in two stages, 20 years apart.

'Our panel has been on quite a journey since it left Swansea.

'After Simon's initial surface clean,

'it has been scanned with ultraviolet light to reveal

'the overpaint, which was then painstakingly removed.

'We have said goodbye to the disastrous dog...'

'..the slapdash sky...

'..and the embarrassing embellishments to My Little Pony.'

-Dylan the overpainter.

-Dylan the overpainter.

He couldn't have painted over a cafe wall!

'The planks were rejoined and the damaged areas have been retouched.

'It's now looking transformed and is ready to take its bow.

'We've invited our Jordaens expert -

'Ben van Beneden from Antwerp - to give it the once-over.'

We're very pleased with how it's come up,

but we're in that stage where we've all spent so much time

with the painting, we're biased.

To have a fresh perspective's very useful.

I understand why.

Um...

It's a great find.

It astonishes me.

I didn't quite expect this.

In all fairness.

I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever that we are looking at

a quintessential painting by...

well, a modello, by Jacob Jordaens.

Splendid.

That's very, very good news.

Yeah.

-Very exciting.

-And, Ben, if we're right about the dating of this,

then it seems to me that that slightly means we have to look again

at his working practice as it's been told to us in recent art history,

the idea that he went around with the painting in the Prado

just adding bits on. He didn't.

He was thinking deeply about the subject.

Well, yes, that is a consequence of what we see here.

We will have to...

..reconsider...

um...

..and you will have to go and talk to...

..colleagues in the Prado Museum...

..and all the people working on Jordaens,

because this tells us...

This gives us information that we didn't have before.

Quite important information.

How common are these large-scale...

..modellos in Jordaens'...?

I would say this is pretty rare a picture.

Not a lot of examples spring to mind.

It is also a very detailed thing in many respects,

although it is a sketch.

It is almost like, you know, a full-bodied composition.

I know it's always very subjective to try and see elements

of a character in the artist,

someone who's been dead for hundreds of years,

but I do think Jordaens had a great sense of humour.

And I love the fact that this little dog is staring out at us,

like he's completely lost in the composition.

I sort of think Jordaens puts these humorous touches in

every now and then, doesn't he?

It's a humorous touch, and at the same time it shows his understanding

of those elements. He must have had dogs...

..of his own. I mean, that is actually what would happen.

-Yes.

-And then you also have the odd dog...

..who is just not interested.

He just doesn't care about the excitement.

That adds to the picture.

You look at it, you understand the story, you see what's going on,

but then there are almost... I wouldn't call it layers,

but there's much more to see...

..when you start looking closely.

We've got another museum label to change, then!

-Yeah.

-The story continues.

The story continues. Again, it's a wonderful find

and I am absolutely sure that many, many people...

..will be...

-..over the moon with it.

-Good.

Well, hopefully, none more so than the people in Swansea.

'Swansea Museum has been ticking over just fine

'while the panel by an unknown artist has been absent

'from the storeroom picture racks.

'But I'm pretty sure Garethe, the curator,

'will remember the day it came home for quite a while.'

We've had the picture cleaned and restored,

and I think it now looks pretty...pretty exciting.

So I hope you like it.

Here it is.

THEY GASP

'When we uncovered the restored painting,

'there was a satisfying intake of breath around the room.

'And another one when Bendor revealed some recent prices

'for Jordaens' work.'

The market particularly values sketches by Jordaens.

In fact, the record for a Jordaens price is a sketch about this size,

from about this period, which was sold just earlier this year

in New York for 5 million.

'And now the cat is out of the bag,

'it's time to get on the phone to the Prado.'