How did a Michelangelo make it over unnoticed though? The history behind the story should be interesting.
It is not a city famous for olive groves, romantic piazzas or baroque fountains, but Buffalo, in gritty upstate New York, does have one feature that even Florence or Rome might be jealous of: a "Pietà" – a painting of the Virgin Mary cradling the body of Jesus – by Michelangelo.
The people of Buffalo could be forgiven for being unaware of this until now. Rather than hanging on a museum wall, the unfinished painting was for years stuffed behind a sofa in the house of the Kober family. Even the Kobers, who took the picture off their wall after it was hit by an errant tennis ball, weren't sure whether it was priceless or worthless. If it is a Michelangelo, it is considerably closer to the former than the latter, and, if similar works at New York'sMetropolitan Museum of Art are any guide, could be worth anything up to $300m (£190m).
