Titian expert says lauded painting is not by the master

Top art historians clash over authenticity of Apsley House treasure

A painting thought to be by Titian, which will be included in a touring exhibition to begin at the National Gallery in London next March, has been dismissed as a "dud" by a leading art historian.

Professor Charles Hope, a Titian expert, told the Observer that The Danai, an early 1550s picture on a mythological subject, is "a later pastiche" and should be downgraded from being attributed to the 16th-century Italian master to that of a minor hand.