In recent years, the tangled web of looted art, dealers and institutions has become a headline-grabber in the art world as awareness of colonial histories and their messy implications continues to rise. Meanwhile, nations around the globe are doubling down on cultural investment, building museums and promoting their national identities through art-driven storytelling. It’s not just about drawing tourists—though that’s a perk—but also about sparking local development at multiple levels. Add to this mix the rapid evolution of technology and increasingly sophisticated global trade in art and antiques, and you get a sharper focus on authenticity, forgery, artists’ rights and unethical business practices. Enter art law: an essential tool for operating in this increasingly complex landscape.
To explore this further, we sat down with Leila A. Amineddoleh, a new face on Observer’s Business of Art Power List. Amineddoleh leads Amineddoleh & Associates LLC, a New York City-based law firm specializing in art, cultural heritage and intellectual property law for individuals, institutions, nonprofits and businesses worldwide. Over years of practice, punctuated by high-profile wins, Amineddoleh has earned her reputation as one of the leading voices in art law and the go-to counsel for high-stakes cases tackling art historical injustices, working on both private and diplomatic international fronts. During our conversation, she shed light on the rising tide of institutional disputes, the labyrinthine process of determining rightful ownership across centuries, the art (and science) of detecting forgeries and the delicate task of navigating wildly different legal systems in a global art market.
How did your career in art and cultural property law lead you to mediating the return of ancient Roman and Egyptian artifacts?
As a classically trained pianist, I attended law school intending to work in the arts. I began my career at one of the country’s leading intellectual property law firms, Fitzpatrick Cella (now part of Venable). However, I wanted to focus on art, so I established an art law group within a small firm where I worked with artists, performers, collectors, and fashion designers. Eventually, in 2014, I founded my own firm, expanding my clientele to include museums, arts foundations, internationally known musicians and record companies, auction houses, NFT companies and even foreign governments. My firm’s first case was recovering a Medieval painting that had been stolen and hidden for nearly thirty years until it went to auction in New York City. We recovered the work for the original owners. One of my proudest achievements was being hired by Greece to represent it in a landmark repatriation matter; we were victorious and created an important precedent that continues to protect sovereign governments working to safeguard cultural heritage. Following that litigation, we successfully represented Italy in another high-profile antiquities dispute. I continue working on both public and private matters involving foreign governments and private entities in the art, heritage, IP and luxury goods spaces.
Art restitution, which refers to the process of returning stolen or looted art to its rightful owners, has become an increasingly important and prevalent issue in recent years for museums and the art market. What factors do you think have contributed to the rising number of these cases?
The rise in art restitution matters is due, in part, to a significant restitution in 2008—the return of the Euphronios Krater. The dispute over the object shed light on the robust market for loot and brought attention to the fact that even reputable institutions play a role in the illicit market. Although the Metropolitan Museum of Art claimed to have bought the Krater in 1972 from a “private collection,” Italian authorities believed it had been looted.
Decades later, an international investigation discovered voluminous photos and documents that revealed a widespread looting network. Tomb raiders in Italy illicitly removed objects (sometimes damaging them in the process) and sold them to intermediaries. Eventually, the antiquities entered the market and sold for hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars. That was the path of the Euphronios Krater; it was looted from an Etruscan tomb. The Met returned the artifact and a dozen other antiquities in exchange for long-term loans with Italy. Other museums and collectors implicated in the investigation followed the Met and returned loot.
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Since then, the public has continued to scrutinize collectors, and countries have demanded the return of artifacts. Public calls for restitution and repatriation have been instrumental in the return of artifacts from Africa (namely the Benin Bronzes), accelerated due to the Black Lives Matter movement. In addition, law enforcement has taken a more active role in recovering looted property. The Manhattan District Attorney has been actively investigating art and antiquities crime for many years and founded the now-famous Antiquities Trafficking Unit in 2017. The group has recovered nearly 6,000 antiquities valued at around half a billion dollars. This has put collectors and institutions on notice that law enforcement authorities actively investigate art crimes. In addition, it has made for intriguing news stories that have captivated the public.
Restitution cases can be highly controversial and may lead to extended diplomatic conflicts between countries. As a result, discussions about restitution and repatriation often become intertwined with political and identity-related issues. How do you navigate these aspects that relate to international diplomacy and cultural policies in your profession?
Restitutions are challenging for many reasons: they are controversial, they involve ethical and legal questions and they have strong diplomatic elements. This is because cultural items are unlike other objects—they are imbued with cultural significance. As such, some people feel objects in a transcendent way. Accordingly, cultural heritage has political and diplomatic currency.
The power of objects can be seen in how they are repatriated. When the Euphronios Krater returned to Italy, it went on a tour of the country and was the centerpiece of an exhibition about looting. When the Golden Coffin of Nedjemankh was returned to Egypt in 2019, its restitution was timed with the meeting of the General Assembly at the United Nations.
One of the best examples evidencing the diplomatic power of antiquities is the return of an object to Iran. Some commentators credited the repatriation of an ancient silver rhyton with opening communication between U.S. and Iranian officials. Only two days after the rhyton’s return in 2015, the Iranian president accepted a phone call from President Obama, the first high-level contact between the two countries since 1979. Using cultural currency, some leaders can rise above current political controversies.
As time goes by, it becomes increasingly difficult to trace the exact origin and history of an object, making it challenging to determine who holds the rights to it. What are the key factors in making this decision? Do you collaborate closely with art historians and other experts to develop your perspective?
Several factors are involved in an ownership decision. First, who can prove that they rightfully own the work? Second, it is necessary to confirm that the item was taken in contravention of a law. The first element can be challenging to prove. In the case of fine art, not everyone maintains proof of ownership.
A great example is Nazi-looted art. Not all collectors during WWII maintained proof of ownership, especially during a period that pre-dated record keeping and readily available photography. The same is true for antiquities. When antiquities are looted from the ground, there is no record of their origins, so it is tough for nations to prove that objects were stolen. Historians and experts play an important role because they can help uncover where works originate or use investigative processes to trace the provenance (ownership history) of objects.
Once the provenance of artwork or the origin location of antiquities is discovered, a determination can be made under the law as to who rightfully owns the property by examining national and international laws and legal precedents.
Those legal cases often involve countries with very different and sometimes conflicting legal policies when it comes to cultural property and cultural heritage. Is there any international code lawyers rely on? Perhaps 1970’s “Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property”?
Generally, there are conflict of law issues, and courts must determine which laws to apply before making factual determinations. Restitution cases are often determined by a mixture of legal tools and ethical considerations. In terms of the law, a country demanding repatriation must first show that it is the rightful owner of a work. Countries generally do this through patrimony laws. These laws vest ownership in a country for all undiscovered antiquities within the nation’s borders and may regulate the trade and export of categories of objects (like antiquities, mummified remains, or even dinosaur bones). Courts worldwide, including U.S. courts, recognize these patrimony laws as enforceable and have used them as the basis for returning cultural heritage.
Some countries do not have patrimony laws but rely on ethical arguments. For example, the Kingdom of Benin did not have patrimony laws when European forces violently looted across Africa; thus, arguments in favor of returning the Benin Bronzes have relied on ethical considerations. Some of the same arguments have been used to return the Parthenon Marbles. While Greece did not have a patrimony law in place at the time of Lord Elgin’s removal of the marbles from Athens, many have urged the British Parliament to return the marbles due to ethical considerations.
While countries in Europe, such as Italy, Greece and France, have this notion of “cultural property,” the U.S. does not. Here, restrictions are mostly placed only the importation of archaeological and ethnographic art and Native American artworks. Could tell us more about those differences?
Every nation treats cultural heritage differently. Although the U.S. does not have a conventional national patrimony law per se, American policymakers have long recognized the importance of heritage. Historic preservation efforts dating back to the mid-19th Century were made by designating properties as historic sites to preserve their integrity. In the following century, the Antiquities Act of 1906 was signed into law. The law gave the president the authority to create national monuments from federal lands to protect significant natural, cultural or scientific features. The law has been supplemented multiple times. Additionally, Congress passed the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (“NAGPRA”), an act intended for the protection and return of Native American human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony.
Interestingly, the U.S. was actually one of the first nations to enact a code to protect cultural items during conflict. During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Lieber Code, outlining military conduct for Union soldiers. It was one of the earliest texts of modern humanitarian law, addressing the treatment of cultural heritage and emphasizing the importance of protecting this material during war.
By law, a “Good-Faith Purchaser” has two defenses: the statute of limitations (“SOL”) and laches. Courts are, therefore, often forced to choose between the original owner and a good-faith purchaser. How can you help and protect a good-faith purchaser in these cases?
Good-faith purchasers should act in “good faith,” meaning that they shouldn’t ignore red flags indicating problematic provenance. The best protection for a good faith purchaser is for that buyer to conduct extensive due diligence to ensure that the work has a good title and is authentic. However, if someone truly is a good-faith purchaser, there may be available remedies, including actions against the seller. However, it is generally easier to avoid a bad purchase (by engaging in due diligence) than to demand damages from a seller.
Can you tell us about one of the most complex restitution cases you dealt with?
I’ve been incredibly fortunate to work on so many interesting restitution cases involving many foreign governments (including Egypt, Italy, Greece, Jordan and Iran), private collectors and museums. Every restitution presents its challenges, whether related to familial issues and inheritance disputes or challenges proving the origin of antiquity, so it’s hard to say which case has been the most complex. However, one of my most engaging was the return of an ancient Roman marble bust to Germany. It’s unclear who the bust depicts, but it is believed to be Drusus Germanicus or Pompey. It was eventually purchased by King Ludwig I and placed in the Pompejanum (a Bavarian museum replica of a home in Pompeii) in the mid-19th Century. Sadly, the museum was destroyed and then looted during WWII, and the bust went missing until my client (Laura Young) purchased it in a goodwill store in Austin, Texas. A sharp-eyed provenance researcher recognized the piece and provided Laura with all the relevant information. I worked with Laura to display the artifact in Texas and return it to Germany. It was a successful example of collaboration between an ethical buyer, art historians, a U.S. museum and the German government, and it was a story that captured the imaginations of people around the world.
Forgeries and counterfeiting are other challenging issues, requiring you to collaborate with experts in scientific analysis and art history. What’s the process in those cases?
Forgeries are fascinating because some of them have fooled the world’s leading experts. After all, forgers can be very cunning. In addition, the authentication process is challenging and relies on balancing three factors. These three authentication “prongs” are forensics (the scientific testing of materials), provenance (ownership history) and connoisseurship (the opinions of experts). Unfortunately, balancing these elements is problematic because these factors may not agree. For example, a forger may have used the appropriate materials and created a credible provenance (perhaps the history cannot be challenged because the purported prior owners have all passed), but experts may disagree with the attribution.
When working with clients on authentication matters, the most crucial step is to consult experts to study the attribution. If the experts lead us to believe the work is a forgery, then a client must consider whether or not to demand rescission, a refund or litigation. This can be costly, so conferring with experts before paying for a forged artwork is essential. On the other hand, if a client discovers that a work is authentic or a “sleeper” (it’s gratifying to work with clients who rediscover a masterpiece or have an “eye” to recognize a proper attribution), then we may work with a client to help place the work at auction or with a potential seller.
Art law is often undervalued, yet it is a crucial discipline for the effective preservation and management of cultural heritage, as well as for the functioning of the global art market. How would you describe your role as a lawyer within the art industry using an image or a metaphor?
That is a really tough question, but perhaps I could describe my role as a lighthouse, guiding clients through the murky waters of the art market.
