THE ARCHIVE BY COUNTRY
Published reports from our archive, newest first.
A country may refer to the theft, recovery, return or legal proceedings. A case can be linked to more than one country.
189 reports · Page 3 / 9
Published on 21 February 2025, this case review describes the 6 June 2024 decision dismissing the claim by Karl and Rosi Adler’s heirs for Pablo Picasso’s La Repasseuse from the Guggenheim collection.
Manhattan prosecutors returned 30 antiquities at a ceremony with Mexico’s acting consul general and Homeland Security Investigations. The turtle pictured was among the objects featured by prosecutors. Image: Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
New York’s attorney general announced that Sotheby’s agreed to pay $6.25 million and improve its compliance procedures. The state said the auctioneer had improperly accepted resale certificates on art purchased for clients’ personal collections, allowing sales tax to go unpaid. File photograph: Sotheby’s in New York, Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images via Artnet.
A federal judge held that Deborah Roberts had plausibly alleged copyright infringement as to six collages involved in her lawsuit against a gallery and other defendants. The parties later settled on undisclosed terms, according to the Art Infringement Database. The image compares works by Lynthia Edwards and Roberts, from court documents.
Detroit authorities recovered the bronze statue of Alexander Jefferson after it was taken from Rouge Park.
The FBI announced the return to the original owners’ heirs after the work had been missing for more than 80 years.
Manhattan prosecutors returned 14 antiquities to Türkiye. The office valued the group at more than US$8.3 million and linked the objects to several investigations, including one into looting at the ancient city of Bubon. Image: Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
Toronto restitution firm Mondex settled a lawsuit with an heir over fees for recovering Marc Chagall’s Over Vitebsk. The painting had hung at New York’s Museum of Modern Art for decades before its 2020 restitution. The photo shows the artist Marc Chagall.
Seated Nude Woman (1918) by Egon Schiele was returned to Fritz Grünbaum's heirs at a Manhattan ceremony. The Papanek family, themselves descendants of refugees from Nazi persecution, investigated its provenance and contacted the heirs. This was the eleventh work returned in the Manhattan prosecutor's Grünbaum investigation and a separate restitution from the seven-work handover in September 2023.
The Fowler Museum handed 20 cultural objects, including a hooked boomerang, knives and fighting implements, to representatives of the Warumungu community of Tennant Creek. Elders, the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies and museum staff worked together to identify the objects before the permanent return.
Art handlers prepare a sculpture for return to Cambodia. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Image source ↗
The Met announced the physical return of 14 sculptures to Cambodia, including The Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara Seated in Royal Ease and Head of Buddha. The works had been deaccessioned in December 2023 following the investigation into Douglas Latchford’s trafficking network. This report records the transfer announcement, rather than confirmation of arrival.
Clients filed a proposed class action in federal court in New York after Christie’s disclosed that some personal data had been exposed in a cyberattack. The complaint sought relief over the protection and handling of customer data. Christie’s said financial and transaction information was not among the data accessed. The court approved a settlement in July 2025. File photograph: Christie’s New York, The Art Newspaper.
A federal appeals court ruled for the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, in a suit by Max Emden’s heirs over a Bernardo Bellotto painting. The claim stemmed from a postwar restitution in which the wrong version of a painting was sent to a claimant.
Maria Iride Crippa consigned a Picasso painting for private sale through Sotheby’s. The prospective buyer, August Uribe Fine Art, did not pay the full contract price. A New York judge dismissed some of the seller’s claims against Sotheby’s but allowed others to proceed. File photograph: Sotheby’s former York Avenue location, Jim Henderson/Wikimedia Commons.
Christie’s removed four ancient Greek vessels from a New York auction after archaeologist Christos Tsirogiannis raised questions about their ownership histories. He identified apparent matches in archives associated with antiquities dealers. The withdrawn lots included an Attic cup and a lekythos. Image: a Christie’s catalogue photograph associated with the sale.
Woodcut carving process; contextual photograph, not an authenticated example of a counterfeit in this case. Image source ↗
Federal prosecutors announced Washington’s sentence for a conspiracy involving counterfeit woodblocks and woodcut prints. He had pleaded guilty in July 2023; the case involved cooperation with French and German authorities.
The US Department of Justice announced the sentence in a scheme involving works falsely attributed to Andy Warhol.
Two stolen colonial religious paintings repatriated to Peru — artwork or case documentation from the linked image source. Image source ↗
Manhattan prosecutors announced the return of two colonial paintings following an investigation into stolen religious art. The release describes the repatriation ceremony and identifies the works’ source communities.
Two eighteenth-century paintings stolen from a church near Lake Titicaca were handed over to Peruvian authorities in New York. The works, including The Pilgrim Virgin, had been offered to auction house Doyle before they were seized. Image: Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
New York police recovered Marc Chagall’s 1971 lithograph Eve and returned it to Carlton Fine Arts. The print was taken from the Manhattan gallery in September 2023. Photo of an impression of Eve: Bonhams via Smithsonian magazine.
A jury found in favor of Sotheby’s on all counts in Dmitry Rybolovlev’s civil lawsuit. The collector alleged that the auction house had helped dealer Yves Bouvier mislead him about prices in a series of art transactions.
