The Detroit Institute of the Arts put together a phenomenal Van Gogh exhibit over the last few months. Now, a private party in Brazil is claiming an artwork in the exhibit was stolen from him in 2017. Van Gogh painting with mysterious past is immune from seizure, DIA claims Details are murky. The person claiming ownership apparently never registered the painting as stolen, nor that he was the current owner of the piece. The DIA did research on the painting and didn't see any red flags. They aren't saying whom loaned them the painting. The person claiming ownership transferred possession but not title to some unnamed third party who then absconded with it. He's trying to file some sort of "quick claim" through the state department to have it shipped back to him immediately. The DIA is countering with some law shielding them from doing so. The article above isn't well written, but it's an interesting story. The painting in question is Une liseuse de romans, painted in 1888:
Interesting. No museum has the right to display artwork against the owner’s wishes. If the Brazilian can prove ownership and wants it back, he should get it back. And I say that as someone who would love to see the painting on display in a museum. But ownership should have its privileges.
I don't think any privileges should accrue to ownership. Ownership should be law, clear and clean cut. Rights, not privileges.
There appear to be two conflicting laws here. One is a law that lets art owners get their art back from museums if they had been stolen from them. This was mainly passed to repatriate art stolen during various wars during the 20th century, but it applies to everyone. Another law shields museums whom, after doing due diligence to make sure their paintings on display are owned legitimately by the entities whom loan art to the museum for exhibitions, from having to give up artwork if someone files a claim against it. This is mainly to protect museums from liability (as long as they are doing their due diligence) as well as giving assurances to art owners that, if they transfer possession to a museum, they don't risk someone claiming it was stolen and loosing their artwork. It doesn't alleviate the claim, it just defers the claim to the current owner of the artwork to deal with. Ideally, in this situation at least, the court should take possession of the painting until ownership can be figured out. The exhibition is over in a week or so, and I think that's what will happen.
There's the problem, though. Unless you register a painting, proving you own it is tricky. I have a piece of paper saying I bought it from someone. Someone else has a piece of paper saying they bought it from someone. Which piece of paper is the real one? There is no official title, like a car or a house. There are registries of fine art that people aren't required to use, but that's about it. From what I understand about non-titled properties, deference is given to the current owner. That is, if someone says I stole something, it's up to them to prove that they rightfully own it. I think this was the plot of a movie. Someone buys an expensive painting, re-sells it four or five times, then disappears with the money and the painting.
I went to that exhibit a few months back. I wanted to take my teenage son, whom I only have every other weekend, and he lives 100 miles away, so we had to go on a Saturday and the lines were quite long, even with reservations. Lots of rules---had to check your coats, no backpacks, no purses for the women, etc, lots of security. But it was a once in a lifetime opportunity, the only exhibit of Van Gogh of this size (75 paintings) in the USA.
Twist: the Brazilian is Anthony Devolder, AKA: George Santos, AKA:Kitara Ravache, AKA: three raccoons in an overcoat...
Being a local, this story is in the news every other day. Certainly interested in how it shakes out, the question of ownership is sketchy at best.
Thanks for sharing the story and information. Life long Vincent fan and due to personal health issues I was forced to miss the Miami University gallery showing and also the 3D walking tour experience that was here in AL. Have traveled many times to attend previous U.S. showings and I appreciate you letting me know about the current situation regarding this painting.
A judge ruled yesterday that the painting will remain with the D.I.A. for the time being. Federal judge dismisses Van Gogh painting lawsuit; art can't be seized
Interesting. Now that I live in Michigan this would be very cool to see. But unfortunately no time off from work before it ends. I’m sure we will visit there at some point as they probably have a lot of cool exhibits.
My wife and I just returned from the D.I.A. Unfortunately the Van Gogh exhibit is sold out for the duration (should have figured that). None the less, it was still a worthwhile trip.
If you were to get a piece of art appraised by a known entity for insurance purposes, that could probably be used as some sort of evidence of ownership, with or without a receipt or bill of sale. In fact, if you own something valuable, why wouldn't you do that?
That's a very good point, and to that point, wouldn't the insurance company have a protocol assuring authenticity as well as proof of ownership? Assuming they did, why hasn't that information been brought to light. There seems to be an awful lot of holes in this story.
From what little I know, owning and selling art can be the biggest money hustle next to crypto companies losing passwords. One assessment I saw is that modern art could be littered with up to 50 percent of fakes. Ownership is equally difficult to price and disprove. Dealers are often complicit in the fraud. A relative of mine was sold Renoir etchings / prints for 17000.00 while they were on a cruise. There is no way those prints were legitimate but I'm not going to tell them because they aren't collectors. They like to think they have something more substantial than what they actually have. I have some "authenticated" Dali pieces that I received very inexpensively. I was told by a dealer they were legitimate but Dali also had a habit of simply signing sheets of paper. There is no good evidence my pictures are legit. The verification of an artist can also change over time. You can own a Rembrandt then have someone come along and state is a copy from one of his students. That would wipe out thousands of dollars in value. I've been very grateful to see the master paintings I've seen but the art world business is a cesspool of well intentioned experts and deliberately manipulative con artists. Its a huge gamble. I think the judgment to the D.I.A. is the right one until enough verified information comes along.
There are a bunch of reasons, ranging from you are too stingy or lazy to pay for insurance, or register it with a fine art registry, or even register it as stolen - all the way up to: - You don't want the government to know you own something valuable to get around some sort of tax - You are going to bundle the painting together with a bunch of big crates of much lesser value paintings, ship them to some other country, put a value on the whole lot as $10,000, and slip it in through customs without notifying the government - You are parking the painting in a customs warehouse somewhere to get around one tax or another - this is a *very* common scheme, supposedly there are billions of dollars of art stored in warehouses around New York City for this purpose I think the judge got it right, here. For non-titled property, the assumption is the holder of the property is it's owner. Unless the plaintiff can cough up some *very* persuasive evidence, the court assumes, for this narrow purpose, the painting isn't stolen. That doesn't mean the plaintiff can't go forward with a lawsuit to get the painting back, it just means he can't use the one specific law his lawyers were invoking to get the painting back quickly. He has to go the long route, through a regular lawsuit. In the meantime, the painting isn't going anywhere. If it were anything else, I'd probably give the plaintiff the benefit of a doubt. However, doing weird things internationally with art absolutely pegs the shadiness meter.
