Read the rest...]]> MONTREAL — Two archaeological pieces worth hundreds of thousands of dollars have been stolen from the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

A Persian bas-relief and a marble head dating from the Roman Empire were taken from the Mediterranean archeological exhibit room on the first floor of the Hornstein Pavilion during opening hours around Oct. 26, officials said. The theft was not made public until now so as not to compromise the investigation.

All Montreal police would say Tuesday is that the investigation is active and ongoing.

One suspect, said to be in his 30s and about five-foot-seven, can be seen in surveillance video made public earlier this week.

The Persian piece is worth “hundreds of thousands of dollars,” and the second piece, “tens of thousands,” according to specialized fine-art loss adjuster Mark Dalrymple of Tyler & Co., a company representing AXA Art, an international insurance company that is insuring the items for the Montreal museum.

Danielle Champagne, a spokeswoman for the MMFA, said security has been tightened in some areas of the museum since the theft.

The insurance company is offering a “substantial” reward for the return of the objects and a $10,000 reward for anyone who can identify the individual caught on video.

Re-posted from The Montreal Gazette.

Read the rest...]]> A square medieval silver coin, minted as emergency currency by Viennese officials as Ottoman Empire troops laid siege to the city in 1529 – during the reign of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I – was among the valuable pieces of vintage money stolen from a Colorado museum in 2007.

Last week an alleged Martinez man pleaded guilty in federal court to stealing rare coinage under his administration as a collections manager at the American Numismatic Association’s (ANA) Edward C. Rochette Money Museum in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Wyatt Yeager, 33, admitted to stealing approximately 300 historic coins and other numismatic – a term used to describe coins, paper currency and medals – items from the museum while he was collections manager from Jan. to March, 2007.

The purloined items were worth just under a million collectively. According to U.S. Attorney Charles M. Oberly, III, Yeager allegedly sold one extremely rare coin, a “Holey” Australian dollar minted in 1813, at an Australian auction for $155,755 in July 2007.

ANA President Tom Hallenbeck said in a press release issued last Thursday that coins were discovered to be missing in October 2007, and museum officials quietly called in the FBI.

As the covert federal investigation expanded, Yeager relocated to Ireland and continued to sell off the coins he had stolen in Colorado at various international auctions.

The U.S. Department of Justice did not specify when Yeager was apprehended, but he was charged with a felony violation of Section 668 of the U.S. criminal code’s Title 18 – Theft of Major Artwork.

“The embezzlement of such a large number of rare coins is a significant crime. Aggravating the seriousness of the offense is the fact that the coins are cultural property, a part of our history,” said Oberly in a DOJ case report.

Yeager faces ten years in federal prison and a $250,000 fine. He will also be placed on supervised release after serving his prison time.

ANA spokesperson Jay Beeton described in a press release how, after discovering the theft, the association hired renowned private investigator Robert Wittman, whose consulting company specializes in recovering stolen art and collectibles to track down the missing money. Wittman is credited with founding the FBI’s National Art Crime Team.

“As a result of the theft, the ANA has embarked on an upgrade to its security systems and further modified its internal security procedures. In addition, many of the ANA’s important coins are being encapsulated by [Numismatic Guaranty Corporation] to allow better inventory control through modern bar coding technology, photography and other enhanced security procedures,” explained Beeton.

“The FBI will continue to pursue those who misappropriate rare items such as the coins embezzled by Yeager and appreciates the District of Delaware’s commitment to prosecute this significant crime,” stated Denver-based FBI Special Agent in Charge James Yacone.

“I want to reassure our members – and hobbyists everywhere – that the ANA is committed to improving the security of its collection, which is a true national treasure. As new technologies are developed, we will continually assess our security needs. Unfortunately, about 90 percent of museum thefts have some insider component,” said Hallenbeck in a written statement. “Many of the stolen items were desirable and historically significant. The ANA maintains theft insurance for its numismatic collections, but no amount of insurance can adequately replace these coins – or the loss of trust or sense of helplessness that we all feel following such a theft.”

Other coins stolen from the museum by Yeager and sold at a German auction in 2007 include a “Holey Dollar” five shillings coin and a “Dump” fifteen pence coin, both minted in Australia in 1813; silver and gold Mexican reales and escudo coins minted between 1732 and 1799; English crowns, groats, farthings and pence coins minted between 1652 and 1665, a silver 1557 ‘teston’ coin authorized by Mary Queen of Scots and a silver crown minted in 1551 under English ruler Edward VI.

The ANA is a congressionally-chartered, non-profit organization.

As the ANA states, the Edward C. Rochette Money Museum opened in 1967 and houses a collection of 275,000 items, including “money from its earliest uses 2,600 years ago to individual coins worth millions of dollars and modern issues, as well as paper money, coins, tokens and medals from throughout the world.”

Re-posted from Martinez News Gazette.

Read the rest...]]> In a spacious, luxury apartment perched on the leafy hills of Hong Kong, Kai-Yin Lo browses through a trove of Chinese art acquired over several decades, reflecting how her niche, scholarly pursuit has now hit the mainstream.

Despite giddy Chinese art prices showing some strain from global economic uncertainty, collectors like to think values will continue to rise due to limited supply and continued strong demand as Asian collectors become more affluent.

“As East and West get into more of a confluence in taste and in the market place, it will still go up,” said Lo, a Cambridge-educated writer and jewelry designer, a slim, elegant woman famously known for wearing mis-matched designer shoes.

She is one of Hong Kong’s leading art collectors — her home is stacked with rare Chinese furniture, stone carvings and paintings, including an inkbrush panorama of the Grand Canyon by Chinese 20th century master Wu Guanzhong.

“These days art investment has entered into the mainstream of investment, especially for younger people. You cannot divorce love of the piece from what lies behind, the value of it.”

Hong Kong has played a key role in Asia’s art market boom. Its auction market turnover — anchored by Sotheby’s and Christie’s — skyrocketed 300 percent from 2009 to 2010, powered by a wave of Chinese millionaires buying art with avid fervour.

“Hong Kong has became the sales centre of the world,” said Patti Wong, chairman of Sotheby’s Asia, with revenue in the former British colony on par with New York and London.

Despite the art market’s vulnerability to shocks, including the 2008 Lehman Brothers collapse, when unrealistic estimates left scores of unsold lots amid tepid bidding even in the red-hot Chinese ceramics market, Asia’s rapid wealth accumulation will likely see more and more money flow into art and alternative investments such as wine.

Asia’s wealth management and private banking industry remains a sparkling growth area for many struggling banks, with an estimated 3.3 million high net worth individuals worth more than $1 million, according to Capgemini and Merrill Lynch’s latest annual World Wealth report.

With a combined wealth of $10.7 trillion, Asia’s wealthy have even eclipsed the $10.2 trillion held by Europe’s generational millionaires.

“The exponential growth in the number of emerging market (millionaires) … is expanding the global market for investments of passion,” the report said.

SAFE HAVEN?

While art often comes straddled with hefty commission, storage and insurance costs, it can serve as a fun portfolio diversifier, mixing decent returns with aesthetic pleasure.

Even as the euro zone debt crisis rages and buffets regional stock markets, the Mei Moses Global Art Index, a widely tracked art indicator, showed an 11.8 percent rise in 2011 to November.

“It may not be a good time for sellers but it’s an excellent time for buyers. During late 2008 and 2009, I highly advised clients to buy,” said Bobby Mohseni, director of MFA Asia, an art consultancy. “With Chinese contemporary art, some prices have gone exceptionally high and that’s just over a decade … so it’s best to look at upcoming or mid-tier artists.”

While stocks on the S&P 500 have outperformed Western art over the past 25 years, according to Mei Moses data, top Chinese and Asian art is still comparatively cheap compared with Western impressionists or American contemporary art. A Mei Moses index for traditional Chinese art showed a 24 percent jump in the first three quarters this year.

“The confidence in the Chinese contemporary art market remains high despite art market confidence dropping sharply in the U.S. and European contemporary market,” Anders Petterson, head of art research consultancy ArtTactic, told Reuters.

Even for those with less purchasing muscle, experts say bargains can still be had in less spotlighted categories, including modern Filipino and Indonesian painters, as well as photography, and Chinese snuff bottles, to name a few.

“Collect what other people aren’t collecting,” said Tony Miller, a former top Hong Kong government official and long-standing collector of scholars’ objects and Chinese art. “If you can’t afford Qi Baishi paintings and they’re going at HK$2 million a throw, well, go for prints.”

Qi is one of the masters of inkbrush paintings and his pieces sell for millions of dollars.

Owners of Hong Kong’s art galleries, many of them crammed along the winding Hollywood Road in the Central district, say timing is the key.

“If you get good works of art, then without any question it is (a safe haven) but it doesn’t have the liquidity. That’s the difficulty,” said Sundaram Tagore, whose galleries in Hong Kong and the United States feature a stable of culture-bridging artists.

“If you’re trying to sell at the wrong time it becomes part of the distressed market but if you’re selling at the right time then you could make 100 times more, maybe more than property or any bonds can provide you.”

The search by Asian investors for alternative assets has extended beyond art into wine, gems, watches, postage stamps and other memorabilia — the rarer and more exclusive, the better.

With about two-thirds of the world’s stamp collectors in Asia, the stamps and collectibles market has surged, says Geoff Anandappa of stamp and memorabilia retailer Stanley Gibbons.

Hong Kong-based InterAsia Auctions — which specializes in Asian stamps — broke world records for Chinese stamps in September, raking in $12.6 million over four days. A 1941 Dr Sun Yat-Sen inverted centre stamp fetched $221,000, up 66 percent from a similar sale a year ago.

Chinese and Asian buyers have cornered the fine wine market, with a Hong Kong Acker Merrall & Condit wine auction in December bringing in $9 million, including a single superlot of 55 Romanee Conti vintages that fetched a record-breaking $813,000.

Similarly, Asian buying is behind the boom for diamonds and gems. China is on course to become the world’s top diamond buyer and retailers in Hong Kong report a rise in the number of men coming to buy loose diamonds for investments.

A Hong Kong jewelry retailer recently raised $2 billion in one of the city’s biggest initial public offerings this year to fund expansion in the region.

“It’s not the old days of ‘safe as houses’, put your money in the bank and that will sort you out,” said Jon Reade of the Art Futures Group, a Hong Kong-based art investment firm.

“Those are the days probably of my parents’ generation … people are getting more creative with their money.”

Re-posted from Reuters.

Read the rest...]]> France has laid claim to a 17th Century painting currently being displayed by a London gallery at an art fair in Paris.

The Carrying of the Cross by the French master Nicolas Tournier was bought last year for 400,000 euros ($550,000) by the Weiss Gallery of London.

But the French government says it is stolen property and that its whereabouts had been a mystery for nearly 200 years.

France has put an export ban on the work to prevent it leaving the country.

Tournier’s life-sized study of Christ carrying the cross once hung in the chapel of the Company of the Black Penitents in the southern French city of Toulouse.

It measures 2.2m by 1.21m (7.2ft by 3.96ft) and was painted around 1632.

During the French Revolution, the painting was confiscated by the state and put on display in a museum, but in 1818 it disappeared.

Nothing was heard of the work for nearly 200 years, but two years ago in resurfaced in Italy during the sale of an estate of a wealthy Florence art collector.

Today the picture belongs to the Weiss Gallery of London which bought it at the 2010 Maastricht art fair.

The Weiss Gallery had brought the painting to the French capital for Paris Tableau, a small art fair devoted to Old Masters.

But the French Culture Ministry is demanding the return of this long-lost work of art and has slapped an export ban on it to give it time to press its claim.

“This was the property of the French state that was deposited at the Augustins Museum in Toulouse and was stolen in 1818. It is a non-transferable work,” the ministry said in a statement.

“We are claiming this painting as the property of the state and it will not leave the country,” the ministry said.

A Weiss company representative declined to comment on the culture ministry’s statement.

Re-posted from BBC News.

Read the rest...]]> Taxpayers will face a staggering £1.5 billion bill if the nine Leonardo da Vinci paintings on display in the National Gallery this week are damaged or stolen, it emerged today.

The Gallery in London has had to nearly double its total indemnity to £3.3 billion with extra insurance from the Government should anything go wrong.

Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan, will show nine of the 15 surviving works da Vinci painted from November 9 to February 5.

The display is expected to attract record numbers of visitors so late-night openings and an opening on New Year’s Day have been planned to cope with demand.

Each da Vinci will be hung behind specially reinforced glass cases to provide maximum protection from theft, vandals or accident-prone visitors.

A spokesman for the Gallery told the Sunday Telegraph: ‘We have sold an unprecedented number of tickets for Leonardo – more than for any previous exhibition in the Gallery’s history.’

The show will focus on the artist’s 18-year career as a court painter in Milan, working for the city’s ruler Ludovico Maria Sforza during the 1480s and 1490s.

THE £45 LEONARDO

Probably the most controversial painting on show is the newly-identified Christ as Salvator Mundi (The Saviour of the World), valued at £126 million.

The painting, which was presumed lost or destroyed, was named as a da Vinci in America earlier this year after being attributed for centuries to Boltraffio, a student of the artist.

It was sold in 1958 for just £45, bought by an anonymous American consortium in 2005, then attributed to the master this year as recent restoration and conservation convinced many scholars it is da Vinci’s original work, though some art historians remain unconvinced.

Critics say that including it in the exhibition dramatically increases its value if it were to be sold, as it gives it the gallery’s seal of approval as a Leonardo.

Da Vinci’s greatest works include the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, which are not included in the exhibition.

However, the Gallery’s exhibition will be the largest ever collection of the old master’s works seen together and includes some pieces shrouded in controversy.

They include two versions of the same work, The Madonna of the Yarnwinder, put on display side-by-side for the first time for more than a century.

In 1898 the two versions of the work, known as the Buccleuch Madonna and the Landsdowne Madonna, were shown at the Burlington Fine Arts Club in London.

One was believed to be a real da Vinci and the other a fake, although the art world was split on which one was which.

New research by the University of Oxford has uncovered evidence da Vinci may have painted them both in his studio at the same time.

Eight are on loan from abroad, and the majority have never been seen before in the UK.

Art historian Tim Marlow said: ‘To be able to see these paintings together is a once in a lifetime moment.

‘Leonardo was undisputedly a great visionary and certainly we are unaware, in the history of art and thought, of another human being who seemed to know so much about the world in which he lived.’

-Re-posted from Daily Mail.

Read the rest...]]> U.S. authorities are set to return the painting “A Fisherman’s Daughter / Mending the Nets” by noted French realist Jules Breton to the city of Douai, France, on Thursday. In a ceremony at the French Embassy in Washington, the painting, which was stolen from Douai’s Chartreuse Museum by a German soldier in 1918, will be repatriated.

New York’s Daphne Alazraki Fine Art Gallery, the most recent owner of the work, assisted with the painting’s return as well as U.S. Customs and Interpol.

Alazraki is returning the work at no cost to the museum. The insurance value is 140,000 euros.

The painting was commissioned from the artist by the City of Douai in 1875. Around September 15th, 1918, the German army vacated the city, taking with it about 180 important works of art, including this painting.

After decades of searching, the museum was notified in the early 2000s that the Breton was appearing in a Sotheby’s auction. It was withdrawn from auction, and after some legal wrangling, returned to an American collector. Subsequently, the painting was shipped to Maastricht and then to Cologne, Germany, for sale. A collector notified the museum of its whereabouts in Germany last year. Various galleries have handled the work over the years.

Re-posted from ARTFIXdaily.

Read the rest...]]> When Tony Greenberg, a 35-year-old retail real estate developer, moved with his family into a 7,000 square-foot house in Westport, Conn. in 2008, he started to fill their new home with art. On display today are op-art pieces that his grandmother collected in the 60s (rescued from his mom’s basement), and more than a dozen other works he bought for between $300 and $10,000 that form the beginnings of a collection of pop surrealist art. These include limited edition prints by surrealist figurative artists Lori Early and Mark Ryden and three plastic “dissected companion” sculptures by street artist KAWS. His showstopper piece that burst the $10,000 mark is a 5 x 6.5 foot painting, “Flower Hairpins,” of an Asian waif all dolled up by Thai artist Sung from the Greenberg van Duren Gallery (no relation) in New York City. “We had to splurge on that one,” says Greenberg. “I look at it as part of our alternative investments allocation.”

Whether you’re young and have moved into a new house with a lot of walls to fill or you’re an empty nester looking for art for your new condo, the search for art can be fun, and with a little extra thought, your purchases can turn into a collection, and perhaps an investment. Here are some tips for new collectors, including upcoming sales and art fairs to stop by.

Check Out The Fall Pre-Season Auctions

The lure of buying at auction is that you can get an interesting piece for what it would sell for below retail, but the danger is that depending on who else is bidding, it could spike and go for a higher price. With original fine art, you’ll probably want to see the piece in person, so start with a local auction house in your region like Doyle New York that handles mostly “fresh-to-market” estate property or Wright in Chicago that specializes in contemporary art and design. You can buy long-distance by getting condition reports and then bidding online or by phone. Keep in mind added shipping and insurance charges.

New collectors might look for lesser works by major names, works by once-forgotten artists that are part of a revival, or artists who were hot in the 1980s but whose works are now selling for less than they left the gallery for, says Harold Porcher, director, Modern & Contemporary Art for Doyle New York. “It doesn’t make sense to buy decoration when you can buy fine art,” he says.

Even if you’re on a low budget, try to buy the best you can afford. “The bargain mentality can be a mistake,” says Elaine Banks Stainton, executive director at Doyle. One client who owned an insurance company insisted on buying the cheapest thing he could find and after 20 years of bottom feeding has a collection of odds and ends. Instead, find a period that speaks to you and try to buy a collection that has some continuity. Don’t just focus on one artist; rather, sprinkle money into various artists and that way, potentially one or two of them might take off. Porcher had a client who only bought American abstract works on paper from 1927 to 1945, and now at the end of his life, has exhibited his collection at a museum.

Don’t be afraid to go to the top art venues. “There’s an issue with art being perceived as very exclusive,” admits Jonathan Laib, head of sales for postwar and contemporary art at Christie’s in New York City. But he insists that even Christie’s, which sold a 1964 Lichtenstein for $42.6 million for casino developer Steve Wynn last year, is accommodating to folks with lesser art budgets. Christie’s “off-season” sales include the Sept. 21st First Open sale of contemporary and post-war art with star lots in the six figures but a good number of works where bidding will start below $20,000.

Christie’s Interiors sales, which include fine arts as well as decorative arts and furniture, are haunted by decorators but individual buyers can find hidden gems at these too. In the August Interiors sale, an impressionist cypress tree in a landscape by a Russian-American painter, Mischa Askenazy, estimated to bring $1,000 to $1,500, fetched $4,375, while a still life of a colorful bouquet of flowers by a French painter, Pierre Lemarchand, estimated to sell for $800 to $1,200 went for just $675. (It was without reserve, meaning the highest bidder gets it no matter how low the bid).

Attend An Art Fair

Art fairs can be the best place to go for collectors looking for something new and intriguing at lower price points. There are typically dozens of galleries, a few hundred artists, all under one roof. You can get a wealth of information by talking to the gallery owners and sometimes the artists themselves. In New York, there’s the Affordable Art Fair, being held Sept. 21 to 25, and billing itself as “shaking up the dusty model of art as an elite pastime.” All artworks at the fair are in the $100 to $10,000 range, with three-quarters of the works selling for under $5,000 (the old top limit). For a look at exhibitors, with links to art for sale, click here. There will be an L.A. edition of the fair Jan. 18 to 22 next year.

If you’re a little more adventurous and live in, or plan to visit, the New York area, there’s an art fair held every weekend in September on Governors Island. There are more than 100 invited artists, most not yet represented by a gallery. Each gets a room or attic space in the old officer’s housing buildings to exhibit his or her work. Warning: this isn’t a bunch of still lifes. Sculptures of bats by Deborah Simon hang in one attic room and swoop through a stairwell; there are Juliette Conroy’s eerie photographs of dust, and Elisa Arroyo’s meticulous folded etchings grouped into 3-D boxes. Artists pay no fee to participate, opening the door to undiscovered talent.

(As an added bonus, on your way to the fair you can meander through an outdoor exhibit of Mark di Suvero’s abstract sculptures on the island in a show put on by Storm King Art Center).

Almost every major city has its own art fair. The Houston Fine Art Fair runs Sept. 16 to 18; Art San Diego just wrapped up; Art Chicago on the pier is in March 2012. For ogling the crème de la crème, there’s Art Basel Miami Beach (December 1-4), the sister event of Switzerland’s Art Basel, held in June. Or head back to New York to the Art Dealers Association of America’s long-running fair, The Art Show (March 7-11, 2012 at the Park Avenue Armory in New York City).

Go Gallery Hopping

The reality is that the vast majority of art depreciates when you bring it home, so you should buy works that you love and want to see every day. If you buy work from emerging or even established living artists, there may or may not be a secondary market, warns Julie Mussafer, founder of Jules Place, a Boston gallery that deals in contemporary artists. “You need to think what appeals to you from an aesthetic standpoint not an investment standpoint,” she says. Some galleries have a quiet policy for reselling work, but you should buy works you’re pretty sure you’ll want to hang on to.

If you have a particular spot to fill and find an artist you like but the painting doesn’t fit, consider commissioning a piece. Mussafar says a lot of her artists work in series and will paint something similar in a different size for a 10% to 20% surcharge. She’s brokering a piece by St. Louis minimalist painter Michael Hoffman whose works sell in the $3,000 to $5,000 range for an investment banker client who is looking for something dramatic to place on a 10-foot wide space above a front entry door. While Jules Place is in the South End, that same client also shops at the tonier Newberry Street galleries. Most galleries have monthly openings, just ask to be added to their mailing lists. They’ll also alert you to special neighborhood gallery happenings.

Don’t be put off if you go to a gallery and the prices of the works on exhibit seem out of your league. Besides the show on the walls, there are lesser-priced works kept in the back by the artist on view as well as by a whole stable of artists the gallery represents. For example, Dorsey Waxter, executive director of the Greenberg Van Doren Gallery, showed Sung’s large-scale paintings in the 2009 show when the Westport, Conn. collector Tony Greenberg bought his painting; now she has a series of Sung’s smaller paintings that sell for $18,000 and watercolors that sell for $6,000.

Support Your Local Museum Or Art School

Joining your local museum gets you free entry into exhibits and a host of other perks that can help you grow as a collector. For example, a patron of the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art in Ridgefield, Conn. can tour top private collections, brown bag it with emerging artists, and visit New York galleries with the museum’s executive director (disclosure: I’m a member). There’s often also the opportunity to buy art. Greenberg, a patron of the Aldrich, picked up a few pieces at the last bi-annual Aldrich Undercover event, where 200 artists (past artists include Sol Le Witt, Roz Chast, KAWS) who have shown at the museum create original art for $300 a piece sold to benefit the museum. Kirsten Pitts, an Aldrich member who lives in Greenwich, Conn. bought a piece by street artist Michael De Feo at the event last year. She’s also bought at an annual benefit for the Neuberger Museum of Art in Purchase, N.Y., which has silent and live auction items. Her pick: a naturalistic painting by Julie Langsam of Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoie set in an empty landscape.

Art schools are another place to look for art by current students, and sometimes by graduates. In Los Angeles, Ryman Arts will host An Affair of the Art on Sept. 24 (Herbert Ryman, the school’s founder, did the initial sketch for Disneyland). For a preview of works for sale, click here.

No matter where you buy or what you end up buying, Greenberg has these trite but so true words: “It’s about trusting your gut and finding something that speaks to you.”

Re-posted from Forbes.

Read the rest...]]> Police in Athens, Greece have just recovered a valuable 17th century painting, stolen ten years ago from a museum in Europe. They’ve arrested two people.

Trafficking in fine art and other antiquities has emerged as the third most lucrative criminal activity in the world behind only drugs and guns.

“It’s a $6 billion industry,” according to former FBI agent Robert Wittman, who spent years chasing thieves, going underground to track down famous works of art. Wittman is thrilled to learned the piece by Flemish master Pieter Paul Rubens, circa 1618, has surfaced in Athens.

“When these pieces are stolen, there’s always the danger that they would be destroyed or damaged irrevocably so when one of these pieces is recovered, no matter how long it takes, it’s a wonderful gift to humanity,” he said.

So, where has the Rubens masterpiece been for the last ten years? “I would surmise that what happened was there was an offer to buy [it] by the Greek police in an undercover fashion, and these guys, they bit on the fish bait and went in there and tried to sell it,” said Wittman.

The problem for thieves, explained Wittman, is that many high profile pieces of art simply can’t be resold like a fancy watch or a diamond ring.

“What happens with these things is that criminals steal them, they hold on to them and then the first thing that they find out is that they can’t do anything with them, they can’t be ransomed back, they can’t be sold because they’re so well known, collectors don’t want them so the criminals are good at stealing but they’re not good at selling.”

Wittman says thieves just can’t resist the lure of pricey fine art. “They’re thinking, ‘If I steal a Picasso, I can get a million dollars for it.’” But they can’t. “They don’t realize that what they have is a white elephant that can’t be sold.”

Art is usually recovered years after it’s stolen when it’s put up for auction by an unsuspecting seller or when police get a tip. “[Thieves] keep putting feelers out within criminal groups, trying to find somebody who’d be interested in buying it and sooner or later it hits the wrong person, a police informant and pretty soon you’ve got a sting operation going on.”

Wittman is now a private security consultant and author of a book: “Priceless: How I went undercover to rescue the World’s Stolen Treasures.” He recalls a big art theft case he cracked while working undercover for the FBI in Europe. “We were able to conduct an undercover operation where I was [posing] as an authenticator for the Russian mob and finally convinced them to bring us the painting.” The thieves were asking just $250,000 for a painting valued at $36 million.

So, why do thieves continue to go after high priced art when they can rarely move it?

“They always think they can do better,” said Wittman. “They figure that if they can take it, they can find a buyer down the road somewhere and that’s what they’re hoping, they’re hoping for a payday.”

Re-posted from MyNorthwest.

Read the rest...]]> It’s like a story out of a mystery novel.

R. Scott Cook, the owner of the now-defunct Cook Fine Art gallery, is being sued by one of his clients, George Ball, according to the Courthouse News Service. Ball filed the lawsuit against Cook for allegedly stealing the proceeds of nine works of art that Cook said were sold at a June 2011 Christie’s auction in London.

Cook and his wife, Soussan A.E. Cook, are partners and owned a gallery at 1063 Madison Avenue until it closed two years ago (the last exhibition listed on the gallery’s Web site closed in October 2008). Both Cook and his wife, Cook Fine Art LLC, and New Yorker Storage Co. dba New Yorker Arts, are named in the lawsuit as defendants.

According to the Courthouse News Service, Ball notes in court documents that in 2010 he asked Cook to sell nine of his paintings at a major auction house. Cook then told Ball he would sell them at Christie’s June 2011 auction in London. However, Ball says that he has yet to see the money from the proceeds of the sale.

Ball claims to have reviewed Christie’s online catalogue for the sale, and reports in his complaint that his paintings never appeared at the auction. The Courthouse News story goes on to say that Cook got in touch with Ball in late June and informed him that his artworks — two works by Picasso, three by Matisse, a Klee, a Kandinsky, a Schiele, and one work by Paul Delvaux — went for €3.4 million ($5.3 million). According to the suit, on August 9, Cook sent Ball an email stating that his money was coming but that it had not “cleared” yet.

The Courthouse News Service further reported that a Philadelphia-based lawyer, James Eisenhower of Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis (who was a White House Fellow during the Clinton administration and the 2004 Democratic candidate for Attorney General of Pennsylvania) contacted Ball, claiming that the proceeds of the Christie’s sale had already been spent. Incredibly, the complaint filed by Ball (as quoted by Courthouse News) claims that after stating that the Cooks were no longer in the country, “Mr. Eisenhower said that Cook hoped to work something out with plaintiff, that Cook might be able to raise $1 million if he could sell some artwork, and that Cook hoped to avoid being prosecuted.”

After the email, Ball, through his lawyer, demanded payment or return of his art from the Cooks. Neither the art-dealing couple nor their lawyer have responded. Ball’s court statement, quoted by the Courthouse News, states that before this incident, “Cook has had an excellent reputation for honesty, trustworthiness and ability as an art dealer.”

Re-posted from Art Info.

Read the rest...]]> Adjusting claims involving damage to fine art and collectibles caused by destructive weather, like floods and wildfires, may seem like a daunting task. Not so, says Heather Becker, CEO of The Conservation Center located in Chicago, Ill. Adjusters can use a decision methodology to make the best possible, most cost-effective decisions when it comes to repairing or replacing art and collectibles.

It’s relatively easy to determine pre-versus post loss issues, according to Becker.

Tools such as a microscope, UV light, infrared, X ray, and forensic analysis can be used to detect condition history and determine a timeline for when the damage occurred.

Much can be detected by microscopic analysis before other, CSI-like, tools come into play.

Becker cites an example of a painting that came in after a hurricane. “It had several tears and holes in the surface, as well as streaking down the front of the painting from the water damage. It was determined by looking at the holes under a microscope, that the fibers of the tear areas were actually old tears, meaning they were dirty, they were covered with a little bit of grime, they were dusty, which means the tears had been there for quite some time,” says Becker.

Though the tears were found to exist pre-loss, the water damage was determined to be related to the hurricane.

Another example involves a light soot claim with a piece that had been in the home of a smoker for several years. “There’s a very noticeable level of nicotine on the surface. And then the soot layer from the fire claim might be sitting lightly on top of that,” says Becker. “And it’s quite easy to detect under a microscope, the difference between the two. Obviously, that nicotine layer is pre loss and the light soot layer is related to the claim.”

In addition to art mediums, high value items can range from vintage cars and wine to emerging collectibles.

According to AXA Art Insurance’s director of claims, Colin Quinn, the process for adjusting a wine loss is similar to adjusting any other type of collectible claim. “The insured is contacted by our adjuster immediately after we have been notified of the claim and all relevant documentation is secured including photographs, purchase receipts and appraisals. We would also conduct an inspection of the climate control system for claims involving wine spoilage,” says Quinn.

The handling procedure for emerging collectibles requires research unless the agreed value of an item is determined at the onset of coverage.

“To avoid discrepancies in valuation the insured may wish to have the collection insured on an agreed value basis. Under this scenario the insured and insurer are in sync with the values at the policy’s inception. If the insured chooses a current market policy there are numerous online auctions and trade publication appraisal services… that can establish values on items as diverse as vintage dolls, model trains, military and sports memorabilia,” Quinn says.

Value in Hiring a Conservator
There are several ways a conservator can assist claim adjusters in evaluating fine art and collectible losses. Becker points out that conservators can do the following:

• Identify pre versus post loss damages;
• Identify condition history;
• Identify previous alterations to a work of art;
• Identify what can be restored;
• Identify inherent vice (Becker defines this as when something is made a certain way, it inherently will have problems that may age the piece faster, because of the way in which it was made);
• Identify living artists’ rights;
• Identify triage options that can minimize claim costs;
• Identify mediums and materials; and
• Identify potentials for betterment;

However, it’s important to note that conservators are not appraisers or authenticators.

“Authenticators authenticate that it’s by a certain artist, and appraisers identify the value of the piece. Conservators should not be involved in either, because it’s considered a conflict of interest. But the one thing a conservator can tell you is, technically identifying the medium of the piece,” Becker says.

The medium refers to the materials used to make the piece. A common issue arises when an owner thinks they know what they have when it may be a reproduction. “It could be a piece that was falsely created and replicated by another artist,” says Becker.

Because of the confusion regarding identification, one of the first things a conservator will do when an item arrives in the laboratory is look at it closely. This examination includes the front, back, sides, and all of the materials. Using a microscope and a black light, they can help determine the medium, materials, and artist’s techniques.

Consider Living Artists’ Rights in Evaluation
A relatively new concern for adjusters when dealing with a work of art concerns living artists. The artist has the right to consent regarding what a conservator suggests to do to their piece.

“So, if a claim happens and a conservator receives a piece, and the artist is still living, theoretically, they should contact the artist or the artist’s foundation and review their suggested approach for consent by the artist, studio, or foundation,” says Becker.

AXA’s director of claims, Colin Quinn, agrees.

“The artist participation in the claims process is encouraged by the Visual Artist Rights Act of 1990 (VARA) which serves to protect the artist work and allows the artist to have his or her name removed from a work he or she created in the event that the work is distorted or otherwise changed, as indicated when the process of doing so would be harmful to the artist’s honor and reputation. Since we work closely with the art community we are respectful of the artists’ rights and endeavor to work with them during the claims process to ensure that the work has been restored to the artists’ original intent,” says Quinn.

Decision Methodology
There are many factors involved in evaluating a fine art and/or collectible claim. As a result, Becker recommends a series of questions to aid in the claim evaluation process. The decision methodology contains several questions:

1. Was the item scheduled? If so, with blanket limits or individual item limits?

2. What value basis was used in the policy – agreed value, fair market value, retail replacement value, actual value? If value needs to be established, proceed with appraisal.

3. Is the piece authentic?

4. Can the piece be repaired? If so, what will repairs cost?

5. Is diminution in value anticipated after repairs? If so, to what percentage?

6. Does the cost of conservation plus diminution in value exceed the value of the piece?

7. If yes, the item should be considered a loss and salvage options can be considered. If no, conservation should be considered a viable option.

8. Secure a condition and treatment proposal from a professional conservator and proceed with treatment.

9. Conduct post-conservation inspection to assess if diminution in value occurred.

10. Receive post-treatment report from the conservator for file documentation.

Triage Savings
With high value art and collectibles, it’s vital to mitigate damage immediately.

When LaSalle Bank suffered a fire, there were 4,000 significant works of photography scattered throughout. Becker and her staff immediately triaged several pieces that were wet and covered with soot and mold. Inside the lab, they opened every single one of the frames, took the photographs out of the framing materials and removed the hinges. The damage was stabilized temporarily until claim decisions were made.

She says minimal expenses were incurred in order to curtail future costs of what would have been much more extreme damages, had the photographs continued to remain inside the frames while further decisions were made.

Another example of using triage as a way to minimize repair costs involves an Early American portrait painting damaged in a hurricane.

“Someone had a piece that was literally floating around in four feet of water for about six hours, and the paint was lifting and flaking considerably by the time the water was removed. We attached what’s called Japanese tissue facing which took less than an hour, and essentially that just stabilizes the paint right where it is,” says Becker. “It’s a temporary stabilization method, and that allowed the adjuster to proceed and go through the proper claim processes. It was determined about three weeks later that it was viable and worthy of treatment and we were approved to proceed.”

She says if the piece had been left as it was, it might have been considered a total loss at a value of almost $28,000.

Becker estimates conservation saves the insurance industry about 80 percent. “If you choose conservation and you’re able to return the piece to pre loss condition, without any diminution in value, there’s going to be a tremendous savings there for the carrier,” Becker says.

Art Education Equals Customer Satisfaction
In addition to the restoration experts, AXA emphasizes a claims staff that has a strong educational background and work experience in art. “This has helped us communicate effectively with our insureds and ensures claims are handled professionally and expeditiously,” says Quinn.

While much of the insurance-related work Becker sees is related to water and fire damage, she admits she’s seen just about everything. “We’ve seen food thrown on art. We’ve seen bullet holes. We’ve seen dogs chewing up precious significant things. We’ve seen children who have taken their crayons and written all over a major work of art.”

Re-posted from Claims Journal.