Law, crime and regulation

MADAM – Last year I bought a basket-case of a canvas from an artist’s estate for £400. I then spent many hundreds of pounds on a new support, re-stretching, cleaning and re-framing and eventually sold it for a profit.

Further to our article in this section in last week’s issue about who pays Artist’s Resale Right and how it applies to sales in the UK where the seller is an artist’s estate, ATG contacted Ireland’s collecting body The Irish Visual Artists Rights Organisation (IVARO) to clarify how this is dealt with in the Republic.

John Biggs Snr is celebrating the return of his stolen snuff shoe. The proprietor of dealer J Collins & Son in Bideford, Devon, was reunited with the French ebonised item by the police.

Entered by a vendor who hated them, a pair of 6in (15.5cm) long 19th century nutcrackers reflected in their way two different aspects of auctioneering today: how smaller country firms see their future and what will happen to antique ivory items when most of the trade in them is banned.

Peter Tompa, cultural property lawyer and coin collector, on the US rules around three key collecting areas

Sussex auction house Burstow & Hewett has withdrawn a rare Maori cloak after its imminent sale was met by online threats and abuse.

Following our guide to Artist’s Resale Right (ATG No 2404) and now published in the Guides section of this website, we have a received a number of enquiries from readers asking for further information.

MADAM – What wasn’t mentioned in your review of Artist’s Resale Right (ARR) in ATG No 2404 is that the ‘first sale’ exemption also applies to auction houses, so any lots from a studio sale which make over €1000 are exempt from ARR.

A UK dealer is considering moving Chinese objects to the US earlier than planned in the hope of staying ahead of import tariff changes.