Database for stolen and disputed works of art launches
The Artclaim website
A new searchable resource for lost, stolen and disputed works of art launches today. The ArtClaim Database has been created by the Art Recovery Group, a private company offering due diligence, dispute resolution and recovery services for the international art market.
The ArtClaim Database launches publicly today after 12 months of development in consultation with art market, law enforcement and insurance professionals. In response to their needs, it offers new ways of identifying and recording interests attached to works of art.
These include a fully-integrated image recognition technology and a total of over 500 possible data fields for items registered or searched. The Art Recovery Group said the new resource provides greater transparency and less risk to transactions by identifying and recording the widest range of obstructions to clear title.
Users of the database are offered four services: a search facility, registration of items, instant alerts and collection management. These services are overseen by ArtClaim’s international team of provenance research specialists and art market analysts. Currently around 5,000 items are being added to the database each week from a range of new, historic and exclusive data sources around the world.
Christopher Marinello, CEO of Art Recovery Group, said: “We are extremely proud of the ArtClaim Database and the progress that it represents for this area of the art market. As the issues attached to objects grow in complexity there has to be a solution that is able to adapt in identifying them.
“Our ArtClaim database has been developed to meet both the needs of the current market and those of the future – a future in which we aspire to be assisting every significant art transaction in the world.”
In the month following this launch all ArtClaim services will be free to use. Thereafter, loss records for uniquely-identifiable objects will always be free to register on the ArtClaim Database and fees will apply to search requests and registrations for works on loan or in storage.