Leonardo da Vinci's outline of the holy picture costs $ 16 million

A rare picture depicting the suffering of Sebastian and the scholar Leonardo da Vinci was discovered by the vendor and valued at $ 16 million.

The Tajan auction house in France announced the painting of 19cm x 13cm of Leonardo da Vinci costing $ 16 million, according to News.com.au. The ink painting depicts St. Sebastian executed in the typical style of da Vinci, in which he sketches the idea of ​​paper as the basis for future works.

The outline of Saint Sebastian suffers from being tied to the trunk of Leonardo da Vinci.(Photo: Tajan auction house).

An unnamed retired doctor brought a collection of 14 drawings to the auction house in March. These paintings were left by the doctor's father and he did not know their importance. Of the framed sketches from the 15th-16th century, the inscription of "Mechelange" (Michelangelo) immediately caught the eye of auction experts. "My intuition told me it was an interesting 16th-century painting and needed more research," said Thaddee Prate, director of the auction house.

Prate consulted from independent painting dealer Patrick de Bayser. Bayser discovered the picture composed by a left-handed artist. He also found two small drawings depicting the candle light at the back of the paper with notes.

After that, Tajan contacted the well-known appraiser Carmen C. Bambach, managing the Sketching and Printing Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA. Bambach confirmed the sketch was da Vinci's work.

"This is a new discovery of the two-sided painting composed by da Vinci. On the one hand, portrayed the figure of Saint Sebastian suffering from the tree trunk. The back is the charts and notes of light and shadow, related to da Vinci's optical research " , Metropolitan Museum of Art, said.