Classic Painting May Not Be Goya's

Madrid's Prado Museum tomorrow opens a major exhibition, Goya in Times of War, but while the show will contain many of the master's most famous paintings from the Napoleonic invasion, his major 1808 work The Colossus has been withdrawn. The reason? After two centuries, art historians say the work might not be Goya's at all.

The painting of a naked giant towering over a terrified fleeing crowd is a classic, but several years ago the show's lead curator voiced her doubts about its authenticity. As art historians have debated the Goya attribution ever more feverishly, the Prado decided at the last minute to pull the work without comment. "If the museum doesn't like it, they should tell us why," one scholar told the Independent. (More Prado Museum stories.)