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Chapman Law Review Article Spotlights Recent Supreme Court Missteps on Sovereign Immunity and Cultural Property, Calls for...

I am proud to announce the publication in the Chapman Law Review of my article: “Turnabout is Foul Play: Sovereign Immunity and Cultural Property Claims”. As the article explains, the Roberts Court has contorted beyond...more

Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2025 Would Extend Prior Law on Nazi-era Art Claims, Overrule Supreme Court on Sovereign...

Seven bipartisan sponsors introduced the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2025 on May 22, 2025, as Senate Bill 1884. The bill would extend provisions of the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act (HEAR Act) of 2016...more

Making Sense of Canada and Mexico Tariffs in the Art Market

Making Sense of Canada, Mexico Tariffs in the Art Market - On March 4, 2025, the White House officially announced the commencement of supplemental 25% ad valorem tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada above the...more

Allentown Art Museum to Auction Cranach Painting Once Owned by Collector Persecuted in Nazi Germany

I was proud to advise the Allentown Art Museum, which announced today that it has reached an agreement with the heirs of Henry and Hertha Bromberg concerning Portrait of George, Duke of Saxony by Lucas Cranach the Elder and...more

Schiele Drawing Returned to Heirs by Family that Also Fled Nazi Persecution

I attended today’s press conference at District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Jr.’s office in Manhattan at which a drawing by Egon Schiele, Seated Nude Woman, Front View, was transferred to the heirs of Fritz Grünbaum. I represent...more

Best Practices for Nazi-Era Art Presented at Special Event in Washington

I was honored to be among the speakers this week at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on March 5, 2024. Convened by the World Jewish Restitution Organization and the U.S. State Department, the event announced the...more

Thyssen-Bornemisza wins Pissarro painting sold under Nazi duress by Lilly Cassirer

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled on January 9, 2024 that the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Foundation in Madrid is the owner of Rue Saint–Honoré, après-midi, effect de pluie (1892) by Camille Pissarro, a...more

Lawsuit Seeking to Stop Deaccessioning of Paintings at Valparaiso is Dismissed

A trial court in Indiana recently dismissed a lawsuit challenging the proposed sale of three works of art by Valparaiso University: Rust Red Hills by Georgia O’Keefe, Mountain Landscape by Frederic Edwin Church, and The...more

German High Court Rules Painting Will Stay Listed in Nazi-Era Lost Art Provenance Database

(Germany’s highest court issued a much-anticipated ruling on a challenge by a collector to the listing of his painting in the so-called Lost Art database in Magdeburg, Germany. The Bundesgerichtshof (BGH) ruled that the...more

Look to the Purpose, not the Meaning—Supreme Court Rejects Warhol Foundation’s Fair Use Defense Against Lynn Goldsmith

The Supreme Court of the United States has issued its long-awaited ruling in the dispute between photographer Lynn Goldsmith and the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts (AWFVA) on May 18, 2023. The Court held the...more

Responsible Art Market Initiative­--Intermediaries and Sustainability in the Art Market January 28, 2022 in Geneva

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

FinCEN Signals Suspicion of Art Market Even Before AML Study Begins

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

A Deaccessioning Decision Tree Grows in Brooklyn—Selling Museum Art in Hard Times

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

“Moralistic Preening” and Broken Commitments Under the Washington Principles—Ninth Circuit Chastises Spain for Keeping Nazi-looted...

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit yesterday affirmed the 2019 judgment that allowed the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Museum in Madrid to retain Camille Pissarro’s Rue St. Honoré, après-midi, effet de pluie (Rue...more

U.S. Senate Report Takes a Swing at Money Laundering in the Art Market But Strikes Out on Substance

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

Paddle 8 Creditors Battle Over Scope of New York Consignment Law

Since online auctioneer Paddle 8 filed for bankruptcy protection in March, creditors of the company have begun filing their notices of claim in the bankruptcy case. One thing on which the creditors all seem to agree is that...more

Germany and its Federal States Announce Collective Declaration with Respect to Colonial Artifacts and Human Remains

Debate has peaked in the last year or so about the treatment and possible restitution of so-called colonial artifacts in Western (i.e., European and North American) museums. The conversation is important for many reasons, but...more

Berkshire Museum Tries to End-Run Pending Appeal but Member Plaintiffs Decline to be Bullied

After four months of silence, the Berkshire Museum suddenly demanded last week that my clients dismiss their still-pending lawsuit over the governance of the museum by claiming that the April decision by the Single Justice of...more

Sullivan & Worcester LLP Assists in Relocation of "Digital DNA" from Palo Alto to Harvard

I am pleased to report on the outcome of a matter we announced in February. After a disagreement with the City of Palo Alto (California) about her sculpture Digital DNA, Sullivan & Worcester LLP client Adriana Varella has...more

A Step Back from the Brink—Agnes Martin Authentication Board Prevails in Court

The decision by a New York court last month in favor of the Agnes Martin Catalogue Raisonné (AMCR) in a lawsuit by the Mayor Gallery Ltd in the United Kingdom is the latest in a series of disputes over the practice of...more

New Court of Arbitration for Art to Launch in June, Offers Exciting Opportunity for the Art Market

The recent announcement of the launch of the Court of Arbitration for Art (CAA) is exciting and intriguing news. There is nothing peculiar to the art market or the art world about the existence of disputes—any businessperson...more

What About Margarethe Mauthner? Van Gogh Once Owned by Elizabeth Taylor Heads to Auction Again with Scant Mention of its...

Since the passage in 2016 of the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery (HEAR) Act, many commenters (here included) have grappled with what the implications of the law will be on the scope and frequency of future claims. Even as...more

Members of the Berkshire Museum Ask Supreme Judicial Court to Stop Berkshire Museum’s Deaccession Plan

(Boston, MA, February 26, 2018) Sullivan & Worcester LLP clients and Berkshire Museum members James Hatt, Kristin Hatt, and Elizabeth Weinberg filed today a brief with the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts asking the...more

Artist Adriana Varella Demands that the City of Palo Alto Halt its Plans to Remove Her Renowned Work "Digital DNA"

Sullivan & Worcester LLP has taken action on behalf of its client, artist Adriana Varella, to protect her sculpture Digital DNA from removal and destruction by the City of Palo Alto, California. Digital DNA has stood in the...more

Members of the Berkshire Museum File Appeal Papers to Stop Museum's Planned Sale of 40 Works from its Collection

(Boston, MA, January 16, 2018) Sullivan & Worcester LLP has filed its papers in the appeal by its clients, the members of the Berkshire Museum who sued to enjoin the museum’s sale of 40 works of art and sculpture. The appeal...more

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