An expert on the works of Modigliani sued for posting his work freely available
ARTinvestment.RU   11 июня 2020

Art historian mark Restellini also said that the Institute of Wildenstein of Plattner holds his life's work held hostage

As we know, Amedeo Modigliani — one of the most expensive and most counterfeited artists in the world. That is why the authentication of his works — private big business, because only one signed by the expert, the document may cost the owner of a particular work literally dozens, or even hundreds of millions of dollars. In the end, among the experts, whose reputation allows us to issue a conclusion on Modigliani's works on art-рынке there is fierce competition.

And here, mark Restellini, one of the greatest experts on the works of Modigliani, more than 10 years working on the creation of the next catalog-резоне (today it is at least the fifth attempt of its creation), found that the Institute of Wildenstein of Plattner plans to provide full and free access to the materials of the work before the official publication of the directory. In a lawsuit filed June 9, 2020 in Federal court in new-Йорка, Restellini asks the court to force the organization to refrain from publishing their research, and destroy any digital copies.

the representative of the Institute of Wildenstein of Plattner, commenting on upcoming trial for the New York Times called the lawsuit "a publicity stunt" and added that he was confident in the right of the Institute to "share their research archives of the art of Modigliani with the public in support of its charitable mission." The course of the trial and the court's decision can have a big impact on the development of the market of the artist. Today questions the authenticity of a particular work are so acute that, at the request of Restellini, he was repeatedly threatened with death.

expert opinion can cost tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars, and if the data allow to judge about the authenticity of the painting will be available for free, it can devalue the work of experts and indirectly affect the price dynamics for the works of Modigliani. That the Institute know about the financial aspect of the case and how for the important expert unique access to information, say quotes from online-выступления Director of the Institute cited in a lawsuit in which he claims that "scanning of the entire archive and publishing it on the Internet" was "easy" and invited all "to resist excessive limitations to copyright and the protection of intellectual property".

The interesting thing about this case is that Restellini never worked directly with Institute of Wildenstein of Plattner. Restellini began his studies with the support of the Paris Institute of Wildenstein, founded in 1970 by art dealer Daniel Wildenstein. After the death of Daniel in 2001, the management of the Institute was taken over by his son guy. In 2014, Restellini ceased cooperation with the Institute of Wildenstein.

In November of 2016, the guy together with the German collector Hasso Plattner has created a new art-институцию — Institute of Wildenstein of Plattner, whose goal was the digitization and extension of free access to historical-художественным documents. According to the case file, documents Restellini, without any request for permission from the author, were transferred to the newly formed Institute of Wildenstein of Plattner. "According to the lawsuit, mark Restellini is and has always been the sole author of the catalogue-резоне and owner of all the major materials connected with his work, — said the lawyer, Restellini Dan levy in, cited Artnet News statement. — Since the Institute of Wildenstein never had any rights to any of the materials Restellini, he could not convey any right to Institute Wildenstein of Plattner".

one can only hope that the trial is not much delay the final phase of work on the directory-резоне Modigliani and fifth attempt it will be successful.

the Material was prepared by Maria Kuznetsova, AI

Source: news.artnet.com