Private Wealth: “Establishing the true ownership of an artwork can be a daunting task, but necessary to guard . . . against financial and legal risks. It should be axiomatic that no prudent art collector would buy an expensive work without establishing credible and lawful title to it. But simply having a title often isn’t good enough to secure the right of ownership. A good title can be easily spoiled if it is discovered that there was a theft in the artwork’s history (perhaps one of the “forced sales” that occurred during World War II). Art theft victims now have more means than ever to wage disputes, and recent court decisions have returned works of art to former owners even when the statute of limitations has expired.”
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