Da Vinci’s Fingerprints: Luke Brugnara’s Gamble on Genius

 

In a nondescript downtown San Francisco office, surrounded by faded walls and fluorescent lights, real estate mogul Luke Brugnara claims to hold a treasure that could rewrite art history—and make him a fortune. The object of fascination: a dramatic Renaissance painting titled Christ Carrying the Cross, which he purchased in a private sale for $500,000. To Brugnara, the evidence is clear: “I believe this is 100% by Leonardo da Vinci.”

 

It’s an audacious claim, and one the art world doesn’t take lightly.

 

Leonardo da Vinci’s authenticated painting legacy is famously thin—only a handful of works, such as Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, and Virgin of the Rocks, are considered indisputably his. Scholars have long debated other works, poring over brushstrokes, materials, and archival scraps in a hunt for any definitive trace of the elusive master. Because Leonardo didn’t sign his paintings and often worked collaboratively with pupils, even seasoned experts find authentication a minefield.

 

Brugnara doesn’t care about any of that. “If nobody can tell me it’s not by Leonardo, then I have no reason to believe it isn’t.”

 

The Maverick Investor

Luke Brugnara is no stranger to controversy—or confidence. He rose to prominence in San Francisco during the 1990s and early 2000s by snapping up second-tier office buildings with borrowed capital, flipping them for profits, and becoming one of the city’s most talked-about real estate entrepreneurs. But he was never a polished boardroom figure. A self-proclaimed outsider, he built his empire without inherited wealth, and often without tact.

 

That rough edge earned him success—but also trouble.

 

In Las Vegas, Brugnara invested millions into developing a hotel-casino project. But when he applied for a gaming license in 2001, it ended in disaster. During a hearing with the Nevada Gaming Commission, he exploded in anger, accusing regulators of being under the thumb of corporate casino interests. His outburst made headlines. “This was a kangaroo court from day one!” he shouted, walking out after the six-hour meeting.

 

The license was denied. Brugnara’s Las Vegas ambitions were stalled—at least temporarily. Still, he held the land and the permits to build, which he saw as leverage.

 

At the same time, his new passion for art collecting was beginning to take root.

 

From Comedy to Christ

Brugnara’s obsession with art began after he bought a Sea Cliff mansion previously owned by Cheech Marin. Where Marin had hung vibrant 20th-century Latin American works, Brugnara envisioned stark, powerful religious paintings by Old Masters. “I didn’t want political messaging or trendy abstraction,” he said. “I wanted craftsmanship. Pure technique. Something eternal.”

 

He was drawn especially to religious imagery, particularly portraits of Christ. He felt there was an overlooked market opportunity there—one shaped, in his view, by the preferences and biases of elite art dealers. “Most of the big art players are Jewish. That’s not a criticism—it’s just a fact. But naturally, Christian iconography isn’t their main focus. That leaves a lot of value on the table.”

 

This logic led him to Christ Carrying the Cross—a vivid oil painting depicting Jesus struggling under the weight of the crucifix, surrounded by hostile onlookers. Sotheby’s had sold it in 1988 for $154,000, attributing it to Gian-Francesco de Maineri, a minor Renaissance artist. But Brugnara wasn’t convinced. After seeing a digital photo sent by a New York art dealer, he began researching De Maineri’s catalog. “It didn’t look anything like his known works,” he said. “This one had power. It had motion. It had depth.”

 

When he traveled to New York to view it in person, fate intervened.

 

The Leonardo Revelation

While in the city, Brugnara visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which was showing sketches by Leonardo—including studies for the lost fresco The Battle of Anghiari. The moment he saw the figures in Leonardo’s preparatory drawings, he felt a jolt of recognition. Two of the soldiers in the Anghiari sketches looked eerily similar to the tormentors surrounding Christ in the painting he was considering.

 

“I knew right then,” Brugnara says. “This had to be connected.”

 

He paid the full $500,000 without negotiation.

 

To strengthen his theory, Brugnara hired restorer Alain Goldrach for a preliminary assessment. Goldrach reported that the painting’s wood panel and pigments appeared to be consistent with the late 1400s or early 1500s—the right period for Leonardo or his studio.

 

The next step was getting scholarly support.

 

A Scholar's Endorsement—and Fallout

Christie’s suggested he contact Carlo Pedretti, a world-renowned Leonardo scholar. The retired professor had spent decades studying Leonardo’s body of work. When shown images of the painting, Pedretti responded with intrigue—and familiarity. He claimed to have seen three other versions like it and suspected that they all came from Leonardo’s studio, with a real possibility that Leonardo himself had painted parts.

 

Brugnara was thrilled. If Pedretti could confirm the theory, the painting’s value could skyrocket—from $500,000 to tens of millions—or even $100 million.

 

He mailed Pedretti a $5,000 check to fund further research, including a visit to examine one of the other versions housed in a Spanish private collection.

 

But as weeks passed, Brugnara grew anxious. Communication dried up. Pedretti had retreated to Europe for the summer. Meanwhile, a London art dealer, Matthew Green, informed Brugnara that some buyers were already interested in acquiring the piece—no verification needed.

 

Brugnara, sensing delay and distrust, stopped payment on the check.

 

When Pedretti learned what had happened, he was furious. He emailed Brugnara, accusing him of bad faith and hinting at legal consequences. Brugnara fired back, accusing Pedretti of profiteering. “If you're a true scholar, your focus should be the research—not the money,” he wrote.