During TEFAF on 28 June, Lars van Vliet will organise the Expert Meeting Provenance and Compliance for Art and Collectibles, taking place at the Bonnefantenmuseum in Maastricht.
The event is part of the activities of MACCH and is supported by the Stichting Waarborg Kunstregistratie.
The importance of safe provenance documentation
The information age has brought changes and expectations to the art trade. Reliable information on the provenance of cultural goods has become more important, and all actors in the art world are expected to comply with a form of compliance that has long been customary in other sectors.
This need for reliable provenance history is evident not only from the problems surrounding works of art traded during the Nazi regime, but also from the problems surrounding archaeological excavations from conflict zones. UNESCO, ICOM and the EU, among others, have already paid considerable attention to this issue. There is also increasing attention for the problem of money laundering in the art trade. It is now important to take the first steps towards uniform governance of provenance documents in order to make the art market safer.
The aim of this expert meeting
The question arises whether legally documented information could lead to a uniform and safe way of registering provenance information. MACCH (an interdiscliplinary institute of Maastricht University) investigates initiatives whereby the existence of an object is verified by an independent person, whereby the available provenance documents are linked to this object in a secure manner, and whereby the information
is stored and made accessible in a secure manner. The registration of provenance documents will not take place in a public register, nor will it give a guarantee that the information is correct, but it does make the ethical and legal status of statements in the provenance documents stronger. During this expert meeting, experts from different fields will explain which aspects they consider most crucial for the further design of a system that registers provenance data as independently as possible.
The Foundation for Safe Art Registration
The recently founded Foundation for Safe Art Registration provides a platform for the art world, science and other stakeholders to share information for the purpose of establishing an object registration system, where safety and independence are guaranteed.
In order to register for the expert meeting, please send an email to Ms. Talitha Wilmsen at macch@maastrichtuniversity.nl. For questions about the content of the expert meeting, you can contact prof. dr. Lars van Vliet at l.vanvliet@maastrichtuniversity.nl.