Call for export regulation overhaul as Rembrandt sale goes ahead

The Art Fund is calling for an overhaul of UK export regulation, after it has been forced to call off its campaign to save Rembrandt’s portrait of Catrina Hooghsaet from being sold to a foreign owner and exported.

The seller, Penrhyn Settled Estates, has withdrawn from the export review process and is proceeding with the private sale, meaning the painting will stay in the UK for now. But the Art Fund is worried that, if the new owner decides to export it at a later date, the chance to save the painting for the nation will have been lost.

In a statement on its website, The Arts Fund says: “This case clearly highlights a pressing need for major improvements to the systems and procedures that are intended to protect our nation’s treasures.”

The painting, which has been in Wales for 150 years and Britain for over 250 years, was provisionally sold through Sotheby’s auction house to an overseas buyer for £35m. On 16 October Culture Minister Ed Vaizey placed a temporary export ban on the portrait in order to enable a public body to try to raise the reduced price of £22.5m to buy it for the nation. The Art Fund had already gathered support for its campaign to raise the funds when, on 23 October, the vendor withdrew its application to export the painting and said it planned to proceed with the private sale.

It is unlikely the new private owner will be able to reapply for an export licence for ten years and, according to Sotheby’s, they are considering loaning it to a UK gallery in the meantime. But the Art Fund believes it is the buyer’s intention to export the painting eventually. If this happens, the painting will have increased in value and the £12m concession made available for the public to acquire the painting from the Penrhyn estate will not apply, meaning a public campaign to keep it in the UK might not be possible.