A legal battle over a collection of 1,800 paintings attributed to Russian modernist masters has escalated after the litigation funder backing the claimants, LitFin, raised concerns it may have been misled about the works' authenticity. The funder is now in a dispute with the claimants, the family of the late Palestinian collector Uthman Khatib, over halted payments and control of the lawsuits, which seek the return of the paintings or $323 million from Israeli-Russian businessman Mozes Frisch, who is accused of stealing them.
The case matters because it highlights the complex, high-stakes risks in the art market, intertwining issues of authenticity, ownership, and litigation finance. The paintings, previously seized by German police who believed them to be forgeries, are at the center of competing claims and criminal investigations, underscoring the challenges of provenance and the potential for massive financial losses when the legitimacy of major art collections is called into question.