Tunstall Church painting is £100k masterpiece

A painting which has hung in a small Lancashire church for two centuries has been revealed as a lost masterpiece worth more than £100,000.

Research by BBC TV's Fake Or Fortune confirmed that the church of St John the Baptist in Tunstall owns a painting by Francesco Montemezzano.

Montemezzano was late a 16th Century Renaissance artist from Venice.

Vicar Rev Mark Cannon said: "We've got a dilemma because it is obviously worth a lot more than we thought."

Montemezzano's work is thought to have been in the church for the last 200 years

He added: "We have to decide whether we can keep it in the church or not."

The oil-on-canvas painting is a Pieta - a depiction of the dead Christ cradled in the arms of his mother Mary after he was taken down from the cross - and is half of the height of the church wall it hangs on.

It was probably bought in the 19th century by a former vicar of the church, Frederick Needham, who had became a collector of Italian art due to a bequest, the programme revealed.

Church warden Jane Greenhalgh, who had contacted the BBC One programme twice in four years asking for help to identify the painting, said: "It has been in the church for more than 200 years and we've all walked by it, thinking - what is that dirty thing on the wall?"

She added: "It's a difficult situation because it is so beautiful and we really, really want it to be part of our church."

Montemezzano, who painted the central panel in the ceiling of San Nicolò dei Mendicoli in Venice, is thought to have been either a student of, or heavily influenced by, Paolo Veronese, one of the major painters of the 16th Century Venetian School.