Turkey police recover stolen Picasso in Istanbul, state-run Anatolia news agency reported

File photograph of Pablo Picasso taken in 1908

ANKARA (AFP).- Turkish police have recovered an original painting by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso in an undercover operation in Istanbul, state-run Anatolia news agency reported on Saturday. The operation targeted alleged art thieves attempting to sell the painting "Woman Dressing Her Hair" which was stolen from a collector in New York, Anatolia said. Turkish police, posing as potential buyers, met the prospective sellers at a hotel and then at a yacht in an Istanbul marina, the report revealed. The suspects are alleged to have initially demanded 8 million dollars for the painting but later settled on 7 million. The officers then arranged a meeting Friday at a cafe, where they arrested two people, Anatolia said, citing police sources. The woman who appears in the 1940 painting is Dora Maar -- Picasso's lover and longtime muse, who is depicted in grotesque fashion, with sunken ribcage, swollen stomach and enormous feet. The painting was sent to Istanbul's Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University for examination, Anatolia said.

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French court orders Eric Clapton to pay compensation over 'Layla' album cover!

The cover of the anniversary edition featured a new three-dimensional, cardboard pop-up version of the original work named "La Jeune Fille au Bouquet".

PARIS (AFP).- A Paris court on Thursday ordered rock legend Eric Clapton to hand over 15,000 euros ($16,400) to the family of a painter for modifying a picture used on the cover of a collector's edition of the iconic album "Layla". Clapton, one of Britain's most influential musicians in recent decades, was taken to court by the family of French-Danish artist Emile Frandsen, who died in 1969. They accused Clapton of using an altered version of Frandsen's painting as part of a collector's edition in 2011, the 40th anniversary of the album's initial release by the musician's band Derek and the Dominos, the court sentence read. The cover of the anniversary edition featured a new three-dimensional, cardboard pop-up version of the original work named "La Jeune Fille au Bouquet" (Young Girl with Bouquet), which the painter's son had given to Clapton in 1970. "It's a clear distortion of Emile Frandsen's work," the court said. The original had been used on the album cover of "Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs" several months later.

The court meanwhile struck down the family's demands for compensation over the musician's use of the painting on the original cover. Antoine Gitton, the lawyer for Frandsen's daughter, said she would appeal the decision. He said she believes the court should punish Clapton more severely for using the painting in the first place without the artist's consent. "Layla" is one of Clapton's signature songs, along with other hits such as "I Shot the Sheriff" and "Tears in Heaven." The 70-year-old was named by Rolling Stone magazine as one of the greatest musicians of all times in 2004.

© 1994-2016 Agence France-Presse
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Iranian President Hassan Rouhani denies asking for Venus cover-up in Rome???

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani gestures during an Iran-Italy business forum in Rome.

ROME (AFP).- Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Wednesday he had not asked his Italian hosts to cover up classical nude statues in a Rome museum he visited with Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. A smiling Rouhani told reporters he had "no contact on the subject" with Italian authorities. "I know that the Italians are very hospitable, a people who seek to make their guests' visits as pleasant as possible and I thank them for that," he added. Rouhani and Renzi made speeches in Rome's Capitoline Museum on Tuesday, with a huge statue of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius on a horse featuring prominently in many of the photographs of the event. But nude statues, including a Venus dating from the second century BC, had all been covered up in temporary wooden cartons, removing the risk of them creeping into any of the shots -- or catching Rouhani's eye. Italian Culture Minister Dario Franceschini, who accompanied Rouhani on the museum trip, called the classical cover-up "incomprehensible". He insisted that neither Renzi nor himself had been made aware of the decision in advance.

The Italian media on Wednesday railed against an "excess of zeal" and placed the blame on the office in charge of protocol during visits by foreign dignitaries. Sources in Rome's city hall, which manages the museum, assured the press that the municipality had played no role in the decision. The museum cover-up was not the only step taken in Italy to ensure the Iranian visit passed off smoothly. As Rouhani refuses to attend official meals at which any alcohol is available, wine was strictly off the menu at both lunch with President Sergio Mattarella and dinner with Renzi. According to media reports, France has baulked at making a similar placatory gesture, leaving diplomats preparing for Rouhani's visit to Paris from Wednesday with a major protocol headache. Italy's anti-immigration Northern League denounced what it called "submission to a culture which we don't share".

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French family seeks return of 'stolen' Constable painting from Museum of Fine Arts in La Chaux-de-Fonds

File image of John Constable by Daniel Gardner, 1796. Photo: Wikipedia.org

GENEVA (AFP).- A French family has taken legal steps in Switzerland to recover a painting by the master English landscape painter John Constable that they say was stolen from them in World War II, a legal source said Tuesday. The Jaffe family say a Constable work, "The Stour Valley," was confiscated along with other paintings and works of art by France's collaborationist Vichy government in 1942. The collection was seized after the death of Anna Jaffe, a member of a prominent family of German-born Jews, and was auctioned off in Nice in 1943. After a number of years and several changes of ownership, the Museum of Fine Arts in the Swiss town of La Chaux-de-Fonds was bequeathed the painting by a local family. The quarrel dates back to 2006, when a member of the family asked the municipality of La Chaux-de-Fonds to hand over the painting. The town refused, saying that it and the donors, the Junod family, had acted in good faith. A judge in La Chaux-de-Fonds told AFP Tuesday that Jaffe's family had formally filed for conciliation -- the first step under civil law to seek the return of a disputed possession. If the two sides fail to reach common ground, the case will then go to court. The town council on Tuesday said it would not make any comment until it had been officially advised of the proceedings. Constable's nostalgic paintings of the pre-industrial landscape of late 18th and early 19th century English landscape make him one of the most popular and valued painters in Britain.

In 2012, his painting "The Lock" sold at auction in London for £22.4 million ($32.5 million, 29.66 million euros). According to the Jewish research site Akadem, the Jaffe family rose to prominence in the late 19th century. Sir Otto Jaffe, a German-born businessman and philanthropist, was the first Jewish Lord Mayor of Belfast and his brother John became head of the city's chamber of commerce. John Jaffe married Anna, nee Gluge, and the couple moved to Nice, on the coveted Promenade des Anglais on the city shoreline, where they lived in a mansion, the Villa Jaffe. John Jaffe died in 1933, and his wife outlived him for another nine years. The 1943 sale of their art collection saw 60 confiscated works head to Germany. One of them, "The Grand Canal in Venice with Palazzo Bembo," a late 18th-century landscape by Francesco Guardi, ended up in Adolf Hitler's personal museum in Linz, Austria. It was recovered after the war by the French state and eventually handed over to the family's descendants, along with two other paintings, in 2005. Those works were auctioned in London the same year, with the Getty art museum acquiring the Guardi for £4.37 million.

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London builders cover up famous British street artist Banksy mural against France

The mural features the character Cosette from French author Victor Hugo's classic novel "Les Miserables". Photo: Banksy.

LONDON (AFP).- A Banksy mural highlighting the use of tear gas by French police against migrants was quickly covered over on Monday after it appeared on a building opposite the French embassy in London. The mural features the character Cosette from French author Victor Hugo's classic novel "Les Miserables", holding a French flag and crying as tear gas billows out of a canister below her. A code which can be scanned with a smartphone appears at the bottom of the work, linking to a video of police using tear gas earlier this month in a migrant camp in the northern French port city of Calais which is home to some 4,500 migrants. The famous British street artist, who has retained his anonymity, has created three works in Calais including one inside the "Jungle" camp showing Apple's late founder Steve Jobs, the son of a Syrian immigrant to the United States, as a migrant. His latest work was drawn on a board in the window of a shop which is being redeveloped in the London's upscale Knightsbridge area.

Earlier on Monday, builders tried to remove the work using crowbars as onlookers gathered round. They later attached another large wooden board on top of it, using drills. The property developer responsible for the building site said it was "protecting" the mural after the police said there had been an attempt to steal it overnight. Banksy's works can be worth hundreds of thousands of euros (dollars). A photo of the drawing can be seen on the official website banksy.co.uk.

A man walks past sheets of wood covering a mural by British graffiti artist Banksy, featuring the character Cosette from French author Victor Hugo's classic novel "Les Miserables", outside a shop window, opposite the French embassy in west London on January 25, 2016. A Banksy mural highlighting the use of tear gas by French police against migrants was quickly covered over on Monday after it appeared on a building opposite the French embassy in London. A QR code appears at the bottom of the work, linking to a video of police using tear gas earlier this month in a migrant camp in the northern French port city of Calais which is home to some 4,500 migrants. AFP PHOTO / CHRIS RATCLIFFE.

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France's Guimet Museum returns looted statue head to national museum in Phnom Penh

A Cambodian museum employee attaches a wooden block to the head of the Harihara statue at the national museum in Phnom Penh on January 19, 2016. A French museum has returned the statue head of a Hindu god that was ransacked from a Cambodian temple 130 years ago, a Cambodian official said on January 19, 2016. AFP PHOTO / TANG CHHIN SOTHY.

PHNOM PENH (AFP).- A French museum has returned the head of a statue of a Hindu god that was taken from a Cambodian temple 130 years ago, the Culture Ministry said Tuesday. The head of the Harihara statue, a combined representation of the Hindu gods Vishnu and Shiva, was returned by France's Guimet Museum on Saturday at the kingdom's request, according to Thai Noraksathya, a spokesman for the Ministry of Culture. "The head and the body of the statue had been separated for 130 years," Noraksathya told AFP. "When the head is reattached to its body, it is like we are reconnecting the soul of our national heritage." He said the statue's head was removed from a temple in southern Takeo province during the French colonial period and shipped to Europe in 1886.

Cambodia is hunting down its lost artworks and statues in a bit to retrieve valued historical artefacts. Museums in the United States have returned several ancient statues in recent years, following negotiations and some legal battles. Noraksathya said the restored Harihara statue will be presented to the public during a ceremony at the national museum on Thursday. The full statue could also be taken for display in France in the future, he said, where there are still a number of other pieces of ancient Cambodian artwork.

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Switzerland returns looted archaeological treasures stolen during illegal excavations to Italy

This vase is part of a collection of ancient Etruscan art returned to Italy after being stolen and stashed away for more than 15 years. AFP Photo/handout

GENEVA (AFP).- Switzerland has returned to Italy 45 boxes of ancient Etruscan art stolen during illegal excavations and stashed away for more than 15 years, including two rare sarcophaguses, authorities said Thursday. "The antiques were given back to Italian authorities today," a statement from Geneva's public prosecutor's office said. Italy had asked the wealthy Alpine country for assistance in 2014 to track down a stolen Etruscan sarcophagus that was believed to have transited through the toll- and customs-free zone that makes up the Geneva Free Ports. "The search led by prosecutor Claudio Mascotto ... at the Geneva Free Ports revealed an unexpected treasure," the statement said. Two rare Etruscan earthenware sarcophaguses, with beautifully sculptured lids representing a reclined man and woman, were found in a warehouse at the Free Ports, along side "many other invaluable archaeological remains". "The prosecutor ordered the seizure of the sarcophaguses first, then extended the decision to all items, considering their suspected illegal provenance," it said. Among the items were delicately painted bas-reliefs, vases and fragments of decorated vases, frescos, heads, busts, and several other votive or religious pieces, it added.

The mysterious, seafaring Etruscan civilisation ruled swathes of the Mediterranean until it was swallowed up by Rome in the first century BC The antiques had been brought to Geneva by a former high-profile British art dealer, previously linked to trading looted antiquities, the prosecutor's office said, without divulging the art dealer's name. The artefacts had remained stored in the warehouse for more than 15 years, registered under the name of an offshore company, it said. An Italian expert had concluded that the artefacts came from illegal excavations mainly carried out in the Umbria and Lazio regions, and Italian investigators linked some of the items to so-called tombaroli, or tomb raiders, they already had in their sights.

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© 1994-2016 Agence France-Presse

German art experts defend slow progress on Nazi-era hoard found four years ago

Head of the Gurlitt task force Ingeborg Berggreen-Merkel speaks during a press conference in Berlin on January 14, 2016. A government-appointed task force investigating the provenance of hundreds of priceless paintings found in a Nazi-era art hoard said that only five works had been identified as looted. By: Deborah Cole BERLIN (AFP).- A German task force investigating the provenance of a spectacular Nazi-era art hoard of hundreds of works said Thursday that only five had been proved to be looted thus far, and defended its slow progress. The government-appointed panel presented its report on the 500 pieces of suspect origin among the more than 1,200 artworks in the secret collection discovered in Cornelius Gurlitt's cluttered Munich apartment four years ago. But the 14-member task force, which wrapped up its investigation in late December, said that only one percent could be shown without doubt to have been stolen from Jewish families under the Third Reich or sold under duress.

Task force chairwoman Ingeborg Berggreen-Merkel told reporters that a new project team would continue digging through records to find rightful owners, adding that they had received 200 queries and concrete claims for restitution. "It remains a duty that we owe to the victims of crimes during the Nazi period," she said, as she handed over a hard drive with her report to German culture minister Monika Gruetters. Gruetters hit back at criticism that Germany had been far too slow and opaque in coming to terms with this chapter of its Nazi past, saying the task force had an obligation to be thorough and respect existing laws. She said the chaotic conditions under which the works had been found and strict rules governing personal data had posed further hurdles. "I can understand the impatience of the heirs and their families," she said, speaking of a "dilemma" between "scientific diligence" and the "interests of the victims". However the head of the World Jewish Congress, Ronald Lauder, blasted the results of the investigation as "meagre and not satisfactory". He said the framework for the future work on the collection remained hazy, saying he "expected Germany to do better, given that time is running out."

Woefully slow The 14-member international task force was established in 2013 to sort through the remarkable trove hidden for decades by Gurlitt, son of a powerful art dealer during the Third Reich. It included experts from France, Israel, Austria, Poland, Hungary, the United States and Germany, and victims' groups such as the Jewish Claims Conference. Gurlitt, described in media reports as an eccentric recluse, hoarded hundreds of paintings, drawings and sketches in his Munich home for decades and another 239 works at a house he owned in Salzburg, Austria. Although German authorities discovered the collection during a tax probe in 2012, they kept it under wraps for more than a year until it came to light in a magazine article. The heirs of collectors stripped of their assets by the Nazis, many of whom would later be gassed in the death camps, have complained that restitution has been woefully slow in coming. Last year, the long-lost Matisse painting "Seated Woman" was returned to the family of the late art dealer Paul Rosenberg. Another work, Max Liebermann's "Two Riders on a Beach", was given back to heirs of David Friedmann, from whom the Nazis stole the work in 1938, the day after the Kristallnacht pogrom. It went under the hammer at Sotheby's in London in June for $2.9 million.

The three additional works proved to be looted were by German artists Carl Spitzweg and Adolph Menzel, and Impressionist master Camille Pissarro. Around 120 works have indications of possible Nazi-looting, with 28 strongly suspected of having been stolen, according to the task force. Some 350 works have little indication of their provenance. Gurlitt died in May 2014 aged 81 and named in his will the Museum of Fine Arts in Bern as the sole heir of the works, which include pieces by Cezanne, Beckmann, Holbein, Delacroix and Munch. A suspected Chagall painting turned out to be a fake. Gurlitt had struck an agreement with the German government in April 2014 stipulating that any works that were plundered by the Nazis to be returned to their rightful owners and the Bern museum said it would honour that wish. However a cousin has challenged the will, a fact Berggreen-Merkel admitted had complicated the task force's work. A ruling by a Munich court is still pending.

© 1994-2016 Agence France-Presse

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Larry Gagosian and Qatari royal family fight over $100 million Pablo Picasso sculpture

Larry Gagosian, who has worked with members of the Picasso family for years, is asking the federal court in Manhattan to reject the opposing side's claim to the sculpture.

NEW YORK (AFP).- A prominent American art dealer has gone to court in a fight with a British collector -- reportedly representing the Qatari royal family -- over a Picasso sculpture valued at more than $100 million. The work, "Bust of a Woman (Marie-Therese)," dated 1931, is currently on display at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York as part of the largest exhibit of sculpture by the Spanish master in 50 years. Larry Gagosian, who has worked with members of the Picasso family for years, is asking the federal court in Manhattan to reject the opposing side's claim to the sculpture. He contends that he purchased it in May 2015 from the daughter of the artist, Maya Widmaier-Picasso, for $105.8 million, according to a legal action he filed in federal court, viewed Wednesday by AFP.

The subject of the bust, Marie-Therese Walter, was Picasso's mistress and model for several years and the mother of Widmaier-Picasso. Gagosian said he had so far paid $79.7 million for the work, or 75 percent of the purchase value. He also said he had concluded a sales agreement with a New York buyer, who expects to take possession of the sculpture once the exhibit ends on February 7. Gagosian further states that he received a letter in October from a British trading firm, Pelham Europe, asserting its ownership of the sculpture and threatening to have it seized in New York. That firm, founded and headed by a former expert from Christie's auction house, Guy Bennett, contends that it reached an agreement in November 2014 to purchase the work from Widmaier-Picasso for 38 million euros ($41.3 million at current rates). It says the broker Connery, Pissaro, Seydoux served as intermediary. But the artist's daughter renounced the sale after a first payment of only six million euros, according to Gagosian's legal filing. A clause in the contract stipulated that the sale would only be considered as final once the entire price had been paid, court papers said. The British company was working for the royal family of Qatar, Gagosian told The New York Times. As The Times noted, the case is complicated by the nature of Picasso's family -- his many wives, muses, children and grandchildren have for years wrangled over his valuable creations. MoMA did not respond to AFP's request for comment, and Pelham Europe could not immediately be reached.

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Suspect "David Turner" in Gardner art theft had his sentence reduced.... Is he assiting with the case?!

By Shelley Murphy and Stephen Kurkjian Globe Staff and Globe Correspondent January 14, 2016 The government secretly reduced the prison term of a longtime suspect in the 1990 robbery of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum several years ago, raising questions about whether he agreed to help authorities recover the $500 million worth of stolen masterworks. David Turner, who was sentenced to 38 years in prison for the 1999 attempted robbery of an Easton armored car company and not scheduled for release until at least 2032, is now expected to be freed in 2025, according to the US Bureau of Prisons website. The US attorney’s office, the FBI, and Turner’s lawyer, Robert Goldstein, declined to comment on why, or even when, seven years were shaved off Turner’s sentence. It’s unclear whether the 48-year-old Braintree native, who emerged as a suspect in the Gardner heist in the early 1990s, provided any information to authorities in exchange for leniency.

handout photo-David A. Turner, from Braintree, Ma.; Criminal David A. Turner

However, Turner’s possible involvement in the ongoing investigation surfaced recently during federal court proceedings in Hartford involving Robert Gentile, a Connecticut mobster who is awaiting trial on gun charges and is suspected by the FBI of having access to the stolen paintings. In late 2010, Turner wrote a letter from prison to Gentile instructing him to call Turner’s girlfriend. She then asked Gentile to meet with two of Turner’s associates about recovering the stolen artwork, according to Gentile’s lawyer. Gentile, who was cooperating with the FBI at the time, refused to meet with the pair and introduce them to an FBI informant because of fear for his safety, according to court filings. A federal prosecutor disclosed last week in court that Gentile and his friend Robert Guarente, who died in 2004, unsuccessfully tried to negotiate the return of two stolen Gardner paintings in exchange for a sentence reduction for one of Guarente’s associates. The associate, who was not named in court, was Turner, according to two people familiar with the incident. When told of Turner’s sentence reduction, Gentile’s lawyer, A. Ryan McGuigan, said in an interview, “I think it means that he was cooperating with the federal government in trying to aid them in gleaning information as to the whereabouts of the paintings.” He added that an inmate would generally have to provide significant cooperation to get seven years knocked off a very long sentence. “Obviously, whatever [Turner] was offering didn’t pan out because we’re in 2016 and we still don’t know where the paintings are,” McGuigan said.

In 2013, the FBI announced it was confident it had identified the thieves, but declined to name them, citing the ongoing investigation. Authorities said they believed some of the artwork changed hands through organized crime circles, and moved from Boston to Connecticut and then to Philadelphia, where the trail went cold. Later, the FBI said it believed the two thieves were dead. Turner is being held at the federal prison in Devens and could not be reached for comment. However, in a 2013 e-mail to a Globe reporter he wrote, “1st and foremost I have not, nor ever will cooperate with authorities.”

FILE - In this April 20, 2015, file photo, Robert Gentile is brought into the federal courthouse in a wheelchair for a continuation of a hearing in Hartford, Conn. Gentile is due to appear in federal court in Hartford on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in an attempt to get a weapons case dismissed. The FBI believes the convict, with a criminal record dating to the 1950s, knows something about the 1990 theft of $500 million in art from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. The 13 pieces of art stolen from the Boston museum have never been found and nobody has been charged in the robbery. (Cloe Poisson/The Hartford Courant via AP) MANDATORY CREDIT AP Robert Gentile was brought into a federal courthouse in a wheelchair in April 2015 in Hartford, Conn.

In response to a request for an interview about his possible knowledge of the whereabouts of the Gardner paintings, Turner wrote that he distrusted reporters and added, “I am not a treasure hunter.” The Gardner heist was the largest art theft in history and remains one of Boston’s most baffling mysteries. Two men dressed like police officers talked their way into the museum in the early morning of March 18, 1990, tied up two guards, and fled with 13 pieces of art. The pieces, which include works by Rembrandt, Vermeer, Manet, and Flinck, have never been recovered, despite a $5 million reward for information leading to their safe return and promises of immunity. After Turner was arrested in 1999 in the attempted armored car company robbery, along with Carmello Merlino, Stephen Rossetti, and William Merlino, Turner claimed the FBI told him that it suspected he and Merlino were involved in the Gardner theft and offered to let him “walk” if he helped retrieve the stolen artwork. Merlino, a Dorchester auto repair shop owner with mob ties, was targeted by the FBI in 1997 after he boasted to two informants that he planned to recover the art and collect the reward. He was convicted along with Turner and died in prison in 2005.

Turner, who was also a suspect in three homicides, insisted at the time of his arrest that he wasn’t involved in the heist and did not know the whereabouts of the art. He was convicted in 2001 of attempting to rob the armored car facility and a variety of other charges, including carrying a hand grenade. US District Judge Richard G. Stearns sentenced Turner to 38 years and four months in 2003. He rejected Turner’s claim that the FBI used informants to concoct the robbery plot to entrap Turner and Merlino and force their cooperation in the Gardner investigation. The judge rejected an additional request by Turner to dismiss his conviction in 2009.

There are no details about Turner’s sentence reduction on his criminal case docket in federal court in Boston, indicating that records relating to the reduction are sealed. A flurry of sealed documents were filed in Turner’s case in July 2011. The only public record of Turner’s reduced sentence is the Bureau of Prisons website, which adjusted Turner’s release date sometime between 2010 and 2013. A spokesman for the Bureau of Prisons said he couldn’t provide information about the change in Turner’s release date, but said any significant reduction in an inmate’s sentence could be ordered only by the sentencing judge. Significant sentence reductions are “relatively rare,” said Ed Ross, the agency spokesman, and can occur for statutory reasons such as the prisoner has attended a residential drug treatment program, is deserving of “compassionate” treatment, or that the prisoner has assisted investigators seeking to solve a crime. Attorney Steven Boozang, who represents Stephen Rossetti — sentenced to 51 years and 10 months for his role in the plot to rob the armored car facility — said Rossetti “would do 100 years” in prison rather than cooperate against anybody, but would readily turn over the paintings if he knew where they were.

Milton Valencia of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Murphy can be reached at shelley.murphy@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @shelley-murph. Kurkjian can be reached at Stephenkurkjian-@gmail.com.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/01/13/longtime-suspect-gardner-art-theft-had-his-sentence-reduced-records-show/1aJ79PcuEbckNjCVk2w5FM/story.html

Turkey arrests 2 for 'smuggling 17th century Flemish artist Anthony Van Dyck painting

A police handout of a painting seized in Istanbul and said to be by Anthony Van Dyck. AFP Photo.

ISTANBUL (AFP).- Turkish authorities have detained two people who were caught smuggling a painting which experts suspect is by the 17th century Flemish artist Anthony van Dyck, reports said Sunday. The Hurriyet newspaper said authorities had seized the artwork in Istanbul after two businessmen attempted to sell it to undercover Turkish police officers for 14 million lira ($4.6 million, 4.2 million euros). The two men had reportedly bought the painting from a criminal gang for $200,000. They were arrested at the luxury hotel in Istanbul's historic Topkapi neighbourhood where they had tried to make the sale, Hurriyet said. Turkish anti-smuggling authorities released a photograph of a seized painting -- depicting a topless woman with her arms raised and two other figures -- without giving details of its provenance. But Hurriyet said that based on an analysis by Istanbul art experts, authorities believe the work is a lost original by Van Dyck, potentially worth millions of dollars.

Russia's Interfax news agency reported Saturday that the painting had hung on the wall of a family in Georgia for 15 years but they had no idea that it may have been a missing work by an Old Master. A woman named Eka Abashidze told Georgia's Imedi TV channel that her family decided to sell the painting in 2010 after falling into financial difficulties, according to Interfax. Two men had promised to pay the family $37,000, but they tricked them and only ended up paying $7,000. Considered one of the greatest portraitists of all time, Van Dyck completed some 800 paintings before his death at the age of 42 in 1641.

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Fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld suspected of hiding 20 mn euros from French taxman

German fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, head designer and creative director of French fashion house Chanel. Lagerfeld is suspected of having hidden more than 20 million euros (USD 21.5 mn) from French tax authorities using transactions via various companies, the L'Express weekly reported on January 6, 2016. A spokesman for Lagerfeld, who is creative designer for fashion house Chanel as well as having his own label, also declined to comment when contacted by AFP. French tax authorities "suspect that in the space of six years the man with the irremovable black sunglasses omitted to declare 20 million euros" in France, wrote L'Express.

PARIS- Fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld is suspected of having hidden more than 20 million euros ($21.5 mn) from French tax authorities using complex transactions between various companies, L'Express weekly reported Wednesday. French authorities declined to comment citing the privacy of tax affairs. A spokesman for Lagerfeld, who is artistic director for fashion house Chanel as well as having his own label, also declined to comment when contacted by AFP. French tax authorities "suspect that in the space of six years the man with the ever-present black sunglasses omitted to declare 20 million euros" in France, wrote L'Express. Lagerfeld, also an artist and photographer, is known for his trademark dark shades.

An investigation is focusing on the 7L bookshop in Paris, which Lagerfeld founded in 1999. According to L'Express, the bookstore houses a photo studio owned by a British-based company, which takes in the revenue from Lagerfeld's photography work. The bookstore loses money and thus does not pay taxes. The news weekly said French tax authorities suspect the foreign transactions allowed the "concealing of the undeclared professional activity" of Lagerfeld as a photographer. French authorities are also interested in the activities of two property investment companies and a tax adjustment Lagerfeld received in the 1990s.

© 1994-2016 Agence France-Presse

Wildenstein art-dealing tax fraud trial in France suspended on technicality.....

Franco-American art-dealer Guy Wildenstein (L) and his lawyer Herve Temime (R) leave the Paris courthouse on January 4, 2016, after the first day in the trial of several members of the Wildenstein art-dealing dynasty on charges of tax fraud and money-laundering.

PARIS - A French court on Wednesday suspended a trial involving the Wildenstein art-dealing dynasty, accused of hiding hundreds of millions of euros in inheritance money from the taxman, on a legal technicality. Dynasty patriarch Guy Wildenstein, 70, faces up to 10 years in prison for tax fraud and money laundering in a multi-generational inheritance squabble worthy of a soap opera, which has been dubbed "Dallas-Upon-Seine". The trial opened in Paris on Monday, with Wildenstein's lawyers arguing there was a legal precedent which demanded the case be suspended. Franco-American Guy Wildenstein is the heir of three generations of wealthy art dealers and thoroughbred racehorse breeders. French tax authorities have demanded a tax adjustment, saying he owes them more than 550 million euros ($600 million) in family money hidden after the death of his father Daniel in 2001 and brother Alec in 2008. Lawyers for Guy and his late brother have argued that carrying out the tax adjustment along with a criminal trial was unconstitutional and amounted to being tried for the same case twice. The president of the court ruled the case should now go before the Cour de Cassation, France's highest court of appeals, which will decide whether to refer the question to the constitutional court. The next hearing has been set for May 4.

Ten months ago, the constitutional court quashed another case against the managers of the Airbus group EADS over insider trading on the grounds that financial market regulators had already examined the case, citing a breach of double jeopardy rules. Wildenstein's late brother Alec became famous during a messy divorce from Swiss socialite Jocelyne Perisse, nicknamed "Bride of Wildenstein" for her extreme facial cosmetic surgeries, reportedly to make her look more catlike. The second wives and widows of Daniel and Alec rose up against the family over their slice of the inheritance, accusing Guy of hiding much of his inherited fortune via a web of opaque trusts in tax havens. That attracted the interest of French investigators, who began probing the case in 2010 and in 2014 demanded the tax adjustment of 550 million euros. Guy Wildenstein insists there was no legal obligation to report trust-held assets on his father's death.

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French - US Art Dealer Guy Wildenstein's Tax Fraud Trial Opens

Franco-American art-dealer Guy Wildenstein leaves the Paris courthouse on January 4, 2016, after the first day in the trial of several members of the Wildenstein art-dealing dynasty on charges of tax fraud and money-laundering AFP PHOTO / ALAIN JOCARD.

PARIS - Several members of the Wildenstein art-dealing dynasty went on trial in Paris on Monday charged with stashing hundreds of millions of euros in inheritance money out of the reach of the French taxman. Family patriarch Guy Wildenstein, 70, faces up to 10 years in prison for tax fraud and money laundering in a multi-generational inheritance squabble worthy of a soap opera. However, court proceedings got off to a dry start as lawyers argued over whether the trial contravened constitutional safeguards against being judged twice for the same crime. The Franco-American Guy Wildenstein is the heir of three generations of wealthy art dealers and thoroughbred racehorse breeders.

French tax authorities say he owes them more than 550 million euros ($600 million) in family money that was hidden after the death of his father Daniel in 2001 and brother Alec in 2008. Alec became famous during his messy divorce from Swiss socialite Jocelyne Perisse, nicknamed "Bride of Wildenstein" for her extreme facial cosmetic surgeries, reportedly to make her look more catlike. The divorce was the first action by a series of women who felt hard done by the Wildenstein men that forced the family to lift the veil of secrecy over its fortune. The second wives and widows of Daniel and Alec rose up against the family over their slice of the inheritance, accusing Guy of hiding much of his inherited fortune via a web of opaque trusts in tax havens. This piqued the interest of French investigators who began probing the case in 2010 and in 2014 demanded the tax adjustment of 550 million euros. The dynasty had valued Daniel's estate in 2008 at just $61 million after Guy took over as president of the family's art gallery empire, which is based in New York. That figure was despite assets including a host of works by Rococo painter Fragonard and post-Impressionist Bonnard and a stable of thoroughbred horses including Ascot Gold Cup winner Westerner. Other assets included a vast real estate portfolio, with the jewel in the crown a luxurious Kenyan ranch which provided the backdrop for the film "Out of Africa". Most of these assets were registered in tax havens.

In 2002 Guy and Alec Wildenstein handed over bas-reliefs sculpted for Marie-Antoinette, the wife of Louis XVI, to pay a 17.7 million euro tax bill. 'Dallas-upon-Seine' Guy Wildenstein is appearing alongside his nephew Alec Jr and Alec's widow Liouba Stoupakova for a month-long trial in a saga which has been dubbed "Dallas-upon-Seine". Lawyers for Guy and Alec argued that carrying out the tax adjustment along with a criminal trial was unconstitutional and amounted to being tried for the same case twice. A notary, two lawyers and two managers of the secret trusts held in Guernsey and the Bahamas are also in the dock. In a rare interview three months ago, Guy Wildenstein said he knew little about tax, declaring: "My father never used to talk to me about his business affairs." He says there was no legal obligation to report trust-held assets on his father's death. According to the French investigation, the US tax authorities will also pursue unpaid taxes for artworks.

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