European Union Will Now Allow Some Art To Return To Russia

Finland will return US$46 million worth of artworks to Russia that had originally been confiscated by customs officials enroute from Italy and Japan due to European Union (EU) sanctions on the country.

It appears that the EU has now amended existing regulations so that cultural artifacts, such as the art pieces in question, would be excluded from its list of sanctionable items.

According to ARTnews, a majority of the confiscated works had been taken to Italy on loan from Russia’s State Tretyakov Gallery and the State Museum of Oriental Art. A Tokyo gallery will also be returning works to Moscow’s Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts.

However, at least two paintings that had been on display at the Paris’ Foundation Louis Vuitton exhibition in France will not be returned, as per the French government.

AFP reported that one work, a self-portrait by Pyotr Konchalovsky, which had come from the collection of famed collector Ivan Morozov, belongs to Russian oligarch Petr Aven, who himself is facing sanctions.

The second painting, a depiction of Margarita Morozova by Valentin Serov, which actually belongs to the Dnipropetrovsk Art Museum in Ukraine, will be held by France until the ongoing conflict in the region dies down, which authorities have said was at the request of Ukrainian officials.

Since the start of the war in Ukraine, governments worldwide have opted to hold onto Russian artworks instead of returning them to the nation.

South Korea, for example, declined the country’s request for an earlier return of 75 artworks, which still remain on show in Seoul till April 17.

[via Artnet News and ARTnews, cover image via Valentin Serov / Wikimedia Commons (Public Domain)]