Painting bought as a Bayeu believed to be unknown Goya will join Prado show

A painting bought at auction in Madrid in 2018 as a work by Francisco Bayeu is now believed to be an unknown work by Francisco de Goya from around 1780.

The owner is Barcelona gallerist Artur Ramon. He bought El milagro de la aparición del eucaristo al San Pascual Bailón — The miracle of the appearance of the Eucharist to Saint Paschal Baylón — when it carried an attribution to Bayeu, according to The Art Newspaper.

Bayeu was no stranger to Goya. He was Goya's brother-in-law and mentor, an established court painter who helped open doors for the younger artist.

The reattribution emerged after Ramon applied to Spain's Ministry of Culture for an export licence, the official permission required to take a cultural object out of the country. He wanted to show the painting at Tefaf, the art fair in Maastricht in the Netherlands.

The ministry said no. It stated that everything seems to indicate the painting is an unknown work by Francisco de Goya.

That decision keeps the work in Spain. It also sets up its next public outing.

Madrid's Museo del Prado plans to include the painting, known for short as San Pascual Bailón, in a large exhibition in 2028. The show will mark the 200th anniversary of Goya's death in 1828.

The exhibition will be curated by Gudrun Maurer. It will look at how Goya handled religion, from devotional images made for worship to anticlerical works critical of the power of the Church.

Early coverage of the find came from Catalonia. The outlet ARA in Barcelona published a report on 13 September 2026 under the headline 'The antiquarian Artur Ramon discovers a Goya hidden behind the signature of his brother-in-law', according to ARA.

What makes this stand out is the paper trail. A change of name on an old picture can rewrite its future. Here it blocked a trip to Maastricht and booked a place in Madrid instead.