Art News. Vasari Codex

gavel restitution schedule Jun 13, 2025 visibility 12 link 3 artists, 1 gallery

men guilty forging selling fake royal furniture versailles

An antiques expert and a cabinet maker have been found guilty of forging and selling nine imitation 18th-century armchairs that they falsely claimed belonged to French royalty, including Marie Antoinette. Georges "Bill" Pallot, a leading furniture expert, and Bruno Desnoues, a former Versailles restorer, sold the fakes through Paris galleries and Sotheby's to the Château of Versailles and private collectors, including Qatari Prince Tamim ibn Hamad Al Thani and an Hermès family heir. Pallot was sentenced to four years in prison (44 months suspended), fined €200,000, and banned from working as an expert for five years; Desnoues received three years (32 months suspended) and a €100,000 fine. Both must pay €1.6 million in indemnities. The gallery Laurent Kraemer was acquitted, with the court ruling it was also a victim.

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gavel restitution schedule Dec 19, 2025 visibility 17 link 2 artists

british museum loans csmvs india

The British Museum has sent approximately 80 artifacts on long-term loan to the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS) in Mumbai, India. The loan includes an ancient Egyptian wooden riverboat model, Sumerian statues from 2200 BCE, a Roman mosaic from London, and a marble bust of Emperor Augustus. It is the largest loan of ancient material to India and the first such deal between the British Museum and a non-Western museum. The exhibition aims to counter "colonial misinterpretation" by emphasizing India's contributions to civilization.

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gavel restitution schedule Jul 2, 2025 visibility 13 link 3 artists

benin dialogue group ocotober 2018

Major European museums have agreed to loan important artifacts, including the Benin bronzes looted during the 1897 Benin Expedition, back to Nigeria for a new museum planned to open in 2021. The agreement was reached at a meeting of the Benin Dialogue Group in the Netherlands, involving representatives from Austria, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Britain, who committed to facilitating a rotating display at the planned Royal Museum in Benin City within three years, though specific objects and loan periods remain unconfirmed.

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gavel restitution schedule Jul 1, 2025 visibility 8 link 2 artists

nigeria hopes the return of two looted artfacts will inspire the british museum to give the benin bronzes back

Two Benin Bronzes looted by British troops in 1897 have been returned to Nigeria by a British pensioner, Mark Walker, whose grandfather participated in the raid. The artifacts—a long-beaked bird and a monarch's bell—were handed over during a ceremony in Benin City in June 2014. Following the return, Nigerian officials, including Prince Edun Akenzua, renewed calls for the British Museum to repatriate its collection of some 800 Benin Bronzes, which remain on display in London.

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gavel restitution schedule Nov 24, 2025 visibility 13 link 4 artists

family says firm funding its legal battle for stolen paintings sought control of lawsuits

The son of late Palestinian businessman Uthman Khatib, Prince Castro Ben Leon, is suing LitFin Capital, the Prague-based litigation funder that financed his family's legal battle to recover 135 Russian avant-garde paintings allegedly stolen by Israeli Russian Mozes Frisch. The paintings, attributed to El Lissitzky, Kazimir Malevich, and Wassily Kandinsky, are valued at $323 million. A Paris court secured the works in January after they were seized from Paris-based authenticators ArtAnalysis, which had been holding them for Frisch. Castro claims LitFin is now refusing to pay legal bills unless it gains control of the lawsuits, violating their funding agreement. LitFin denies the allegations, stating it has always honored its contractual obligations.

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gavel restitution schedule Aug 4, 2025 visibility 13 link 10 artists

Museums in New York and Los Angeles receive collection of 63 Modern works

The Henry and Rose Pearlman Foundation has announced the distribution of its 63-work collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, and modern art among three major US museums: the Brooklyn Museum (29 works), the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA, 6 works), and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA, 28 works). The collection includes pieces by Chaïm Soutine, Edgar Degas, Amedeo Modigliani, Vincent van Gogh, Édouard Manet, and Paul Cézanne. The foundation, established in the 1950s by Brooklyn-born businessman Henry Pearlman and his wife Rose, had long-term loans to the Princeton University Art Museum and organized traveling exhibitions before deciding to permanently place the remaining works.

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gavel restitution schedule Jul 3, 2025 visibility 14 link 4 artists

mfa boston returns benin bronze robert owen lehman

The Museum of Fine Arts Boston has returned two Benin Bronzes—a 16th/17th-century terracotta and iron Commemorative Head and a 16th-century bronze Relief Plaque—to the Kingdom of Benin. The works were looted by British soldiers during the 1897 attack on Benin City, later acquired by collector Robert Owen Lehman Jr., and donated to the MFA in 2013 and 2018. The repatriation ceremony took place on June 27 at Nigeria House in New York, with the items handed over to Prince Aghatise Erediauwa and Ambassador Samson Itegboje. The MFA closed its Benin Kingdom Gallery in April and noted that three other Benin works donated by Lehman remain in its collection pending further provenance research.

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gavel restitution schedule May 13, 2025 visibility 14 link 3 artists

germany settles century long restitution over royal artifacts

Germany’s federal government, along with the states of Berlin and Brandenburg, has reached a settlement with the descendants of the House of Hohenzollern, ending a nearly century-long legal dispute over ownership of 27,000 artworks. The collection includes a portrait by Lucas Cranach the Elder and an 18th-century table service commissioned by Emperor Frederick II. Wolfram Weimer, Germany’s new Minister of State for Culture, announced the deal in Berlin, confirming the works will remain in public museums such as the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation and the German Historical Museum.

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gavel restitution schedule May 2, 2025 visibility 16 link 7 artists

Masterworks from Jacob Rothschild collection go to London's National Gallery and V&A under acceptance in lieu scheme

Two masterworks from the collection of the late Jacob Rothschild—Guercino's *King David* (1651) and John Deare's *Edward and Eleanor* (1790)—have been allocated to London's National Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) respectively under the UK's acceptance in lieu (AIL) scheme. The Guercino painting settles £5.6 million in inheritance tax, and will be reunited with two related Guercino works already at the National Gallery. The marble relief by Deare enters the V&A's collection.

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gavel restitution schedule Jul 3, 2025 visibility 14 link 3 artists

MFA Boston returns two works to Kingdom of Benin

The Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) Boston has returned two looted artefacts—a bronze relief plaque and a terracotta and iron head—to the Oba of Benin during a ceremony at Nigeria House in New York City. The works, stolen by British forces during the 1897 punitive expedition against the Kingdom of Benin, were traced to the collection of Augustus Pitt-Rivers and later acquired by investment titan Robert Owen Lehman, who donated them to the MFA in 2013 and 2018. The pieces will be handed over to Nigeria's National Commission for Museums and Monuments and ultimately to His Royal Majesty Omo N’Oba Ewuare II.

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