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141 headlines · 12 months
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nypost.com
Ely Sakhai, owner of Exclusive Art, pleaded guilty to wire fraud and conspiracy for commissioning forgeries of works by Marc Chagall, Amedeo Modigliani, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Klee and Paul Gaugin, and selling them for about $7 million over 15 years. He agreed to pay $12.5 million in restitution and to forfeit 11 paintings; gallery manager Houshi Sandjaby also pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy.
elpais.com
Gauguin's Maternidad II sold for 39.2 million dollars (30.7 million euros) at a Sotheby's New York sale, part of a session in which Paul Gauguin, Amedeo Modigliani, Piet Mondrian and Henry Moore set new records. The work, created around 1899 in Tahiti, was among pieces with high private ownership and had sparked interest including a potential acquisition by the Paul Getty Museum; the buyer was not identified.
today.com
Monet painting fetches $20.1 million. The work is Claude Monet’s 1904 London Parliament series painting London, the Parliament, Effects of Sun in the Fog and was bought at Christie’s by Samir Traboulsi, with a presale estimate of $12 to $18 million.
latimes.com
The FBI seized a circa-1922 painting titled Femme en Blanc (Woman in White) amid an ownership dispute in Chicago, where Marilyn Alsdorf resides. The work, believed stolen by the Nazis from the grandmother of Oakland-based heir Thomas Bennigson, had been shipped from Los Angeles to Alsdorf in 2002 after being exhibited by an art dealer there.
abc.net.au
Pablo Picasso’s long-lost painting Femme en Blanc (also known as Femme Assise) was seized in Chicago by US authorities as stolen property; the work, painted around 1922 and valued at about $10 million, was looted by the Nazis and had resurfaced in Los Angeles in 2001 before the seizure. The case involves its ownership history including Carlota Landsberg, Marilynn Alsdorf, and others connected to its provenance.
theartnewspaper.com
The Art Newspaper reports that Corbis has signed a two-year contract to become the exclusive agent for digital images of Warhol and his work, launching a Warhol website with over 500 images. Gary Shenk comments on licensing, and the Warhol Foundation will receive royalties; Corbis already represents other archives and has various museum deals. Corbis’s revenue last year was around $140 million.
theartnewspaper.com
London Impressionist and Modern art sales report: Modigliani and Matisse overtake soft-focus Impressionists. The article discusses Sotheby’s and Christie’s sales in June 2004, noting Modigliani, Matisse, Van Gogh, Picasso and Kandinsky as top performers, with Renoir, Sisley, Pissarro and Degas lagging. It mentions the highest price of the week for Matisse’s Odalisque au fauteuil noir at £6.6 million ($12 million) and a unsold Renoir piece at £5.9 million (est. £6/8 million), along with currency effects and buyer origins.
latimes.com
The California Supreme Court will decide if state courts can hear a dispute over the ownership of a Picasso painting alleged to have been stolen by Nazis during World War II. The case centers on Picasso’s 1922 oil painting Femme en blanc (Woman in White), which circulated through Paris and Chicago collectors before entering Los Angeles and Chicago exhibitions. The lawsuit was filed by Thomas Bennigson against Marilyn Alsdorf and related parties seeking restoration of the painting, with provenance research cited by Art Loss Register indicating it was stolen.