Landing just in time to absorb you during the Summer holidays, the July 2019 issue of Art Antiquity & Law (Vol. XXIV, Issue 2) has been released in print and online. Subscriptions are available either as hardcopy only, digital only as well as digital + hardcopy packages and can be purchased directly through our website.

Vinay Kumar Gupta gives a very detailed account of the difficulties faced by Indian authorities when it comes to recovering looted objects, especially as many of these are illegally exported from the country through the use of disguising techniques that very much resemble the modus operandi uncovered in the Tokeley-Parry/Schultz case. He further discusses the legislation in place during colonial times and compares it to the post-colonial era of smuggling.

Looking at Nigeria, Afolasade A. Adewumi considers the care currently given to historical treasures and urges the local government to take action with regards to the protection of the national archives. Afolasade appropriately reminds us that ‘[w]hen historical records are destroyed, history is wiped out forever’, a lesson that all of us should never forget.

Closer to home, Sinclaire Devereux Marber discusses the possible implications of Brexit on the Artist’s Resale Right Regime in the United Kingdom. As the UK has historically been reluctant to adopt this right, the article considers the much-debated possibility of repealing the ARR legislation in a post-Brexit scenario, although the author cautions that predicting the economic implications of such a repeal is an uncertain exercise, given the opacity of the art market.

Giulia Bernabei analyses how international courts have evolved in terms of the protection afforded to cultural heritage in light of what she quotes as an ‘international criminalisation of the intentional destruction of cultural heritage’. Following said analysis, she carefully identifies a lacuna between the different interpretations given by the courts to the norms in the international protection of cultural heritage and addresses ways through which this gap might be bridged.

Furthermore, there are a number of case notes on the most relevant rulings given recently, including the reverberating De Pury litigation regarding fiduciary duties and the right to commission in ACLBDD Holdings Ltd v. Staechelin & Others in the UK. On the US side, William L. Charron examines the policy implications of the latest decision in the Cassirer v. Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Foundation case, involving a Nazi-looted painting by the Impressionist artist Camille Pissarro.  Further abroad, Sebastián Green Martínez discusses damage to cultural heritage in Argentina through the latest Basilica de Nuestra Señora de la Merced case. In Australia, Nina Lala examines the difficulty of getting admissible evidence of authenticity to court, in relation to contemporary art forgeries, when it comes to proving deception in art fraud, as the proceedings in R. v. Gant and Siddique have shown.

Lastly, Julia Rodrigues Casella Hommes recounts the ‘Art on the Move’ Seminar held by the Institute of Art & Law with the support of Maurice Turnor Gardner LLP in late June. For those who were unable to attend in June as well as for those curious to learn more about IAL’s Seminars, there is a detailed account of the proceedings of the afternoon as well as a summary of the key messages of each panellist’s lecture, the overall tone of the debates and the audience’s Q&A.

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