Romania has secured a “long-term hold” on a painting by El Greco that was pulled from a Christie’s New York Old Masters sale in February, following a claim by the Romanian government that the work was unlawfully taken from its national collection.
With the legal move, Romania has ensured that the painting, titled Saint Sebastian (1610–1614), will remain at Christie’s New York “until Romania’s recovery efforts are heard and resolved by the proper legal authorities”, per a letter first shared with the Art Newspaper by Nixon Peabody, the law firm representing Romania in New York. The Romanian government has initiated litigation to recover the painting through Paris.
Saint Sebastian was pulled from auction in February after intervention from the Romanian government, which claimed the work as being “unequivocally the property of the Romanian state.” It was estimated to be worth between $7 million and $9 million and positioned in February as the top lot at the Christie’s Old Masters sale.
Court filings have since revealed the owner of the El Greco as Dmitry Rybolovlev, the Monaco-based Russian billionaire who consigned Salvator Mundi, the painting attributed to Leonardo da Vinci and sold for a record-breaking $450 million in 2017.
Rybolovlev reportedly acquired the El Greco work from embattled Swiss dealer Yves Bouvier, whom the businessman has been ensnared in a series of legal dramas with for a decade. According to court filings, Rybolovlev purchased Saint Sebastian from Bouvier in 2010 through Accent Delight, his British Virgin Islands-incorporated offshore company used for art dealings. The Romanian suit claims that Christie’s provenance records were “misleading,” as they state Rybolovlev acquired the work directly from the dealer Giraud Pissarro Ségalot, omitting Bouvier’s involvement.
A Christie’s spokesperson queried on the case in February said the auction house “takes these matters seriously” and out of an “abundance of caution” withdrew the lot from sale while the involved parties resolve their legal dispute.
The Romanian government is arguing that the painting should be restituted as it was illegally removed from its national collection in 1947 by King Michael I, the last king of Romania, after he was forced to flee the country amid the Communist ascension to power. According to a now-deleted online catalogue entry published by Christie’s, the painting remained in the country until roughly 1976, when it entered the holdings of Wildenstein & Co. gallery in New York. Over the following decade, Romanian government officials lobbied to restitute the painting, as well as several others also pulled from its collection by the exiled monarch.
Christie’s provenance stated that “ownership transferred to King Michael I of Romania (1921-2017), 11-12 November 1947, with the accord of the Romanian government, by whom sold to the below in 1976, with Wildenstein & Co., New York, in 1976”. Saint Sebastian was reportedly acquired in 1898 by King Carol I of Romania, who bequeathed it the following year to Royal Crown of Romanian.
The Romanian Finance Ministry has rebuked this narrative as “false” and “unequivocally denies the contention that the painting Saint Sebastian by El Greco was transferred from the Romanian state/government’s collection with its consent or accord”. The ministry added in a statement that “there is no document on record of a valid accord of the Romanian government that would have transferred ownership of the painting in 1947”.
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