Consistent with efforts in recent years to apply banking laws to the art market, the prospects of passage of a bill in Congress that would apply those rules to a broad category of advisors and attorneys have recently...more
After a two-year hiatus, the Responsible Art Market Initiative is planning a return to its in-person annual conference at the end of this month in Geneva. For anyone who has attended RAM events or used its catalogue of...more
We were privileged to file today a petition for certiorari with the Supreme Court of the United States on behalf of our client, art dealer Alexander Khochinsky. The petition asks the Court for reinstatement of a lawsuit...more
11/8/2021
/ Art Dealers ,
Due Process ,
Extradition ,
Fine Art ,
First Amendment ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Foreign Sovereigns ,
International Litigation ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Petition for Writ of Certiorari ,
Poland ,
Restitution ,
Retaliatory Arrests ,
SCOTUS
The Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) today published in the Federal Register notice of proposed regulations related to the implementation of amendments to the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA)...more
9/24/2021
/ Anti-Money Laundering ,
Art Collections ,
Art Dealers ,
Art Sales ,
Bank Secrecy Act ,
Financial Institutions ,
FinCEN ,
Fine Art ,
NDAA ,
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Rulemaking Process
In connection with the late-2020 amendment to the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) to include “dealers in antiquities” as a result of its inclusion in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the Treasury Department’s Financial...more
3/24/2021
/ Anti-Money Laundering ,
Art ,
Art Auctions ,
Art Collections ,
Art Dealers ,
Art Sales ,
Bank Secrecy Act ,
FinCEN ,
Fine Art ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
NDAA ,
Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs)
Robin Pogrebin at the New York Times has written an excellent piece on the news that the Brooklyn Museum intends to sell several works from its collection to raise money. The museum explicitly relies on the pandemic-inspired...more
9/24/2020
/ Art ,
Art Auctions ,
Art Collections ,
Art Dealers ,
Art Sales ,
Artists ,
Cultural Artifacts ,
Fine Art ,
Historic Preservation ,
Museums ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings
A recent report by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (headlined by Chairman Senator Rob Portman, Republican of Ohio, and Ranking Member Tom Carper, Democrat of Delaware) has drawn widespread attention...more
8/13/2020
/ Anti-Money Laundering ,
Art ,
Art Auctions ,
Art Collections ,
Art Dealers ,
Art Sales ,
Bank Secrecy Act ,
Cultural Artifacts ,
Customer Due Diligence (CDD) ,
Financial Regulatory Reform ,
FinCEN ,
Fine Art ,
Know Your Customers ,
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) ,
Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) ,
Uniform Commercial Code (UCC)
The Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz (Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, or SPK) in Berlin announced that it had agreed to restitute a 1537 painting of the biblical figure Lot by Hans Baldung Grien to the heirs of Hans...more
1/23/2020
/ Appraisal ,
Art Collections ,
Art Dealers ,
Cultural Artifacts ,
Fair Market Value ,
Fine Art ,
Germany ,
Heirs ,
Museums ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Restitution ,
Stolen Goods
Casting aspersions about the art market is a popular pastime. And no doubt there is much about the commercial art world that invites this criticism, not least a tendency towards secrecy (or discretion, depending whom you...more
I was pleased to attend last week in Geneva “Building an Art Market for the Future—Guidelines for Countering Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Threats” hosted by the Fondation pour le Droit d’Art (Art Law Foundation)...more
The ongoing saga between Yves Bouvier and Dmitri Rybolovlev over Bouvier’s sale to the Russian billionaire of Leonardo’s Salvator Mundi (and a recent preemptive suit by Sotheby’s against the original sellers of the work to...more