Changing Values

The other day fellow appraiser  Susan McDonough, AAA sent me a post from the Center for Art Law on a Canadian Cultural Property Review Board, an appraisal and a change in authentication. The article has also been posted on some Linked In groups, but it case you missed it, it is well worth reading as there is a valuation difference from the accepted $31 million (Canadian) in issued tax certificates and a new value of several hundred thousand Canadian dollars.

The Center for Art Law reports

The ensuing controversy making headlines in Canada is centered on the appraised value of the collection. That is, the donation of the sculptures by Corporate House (a financial group) to the Museum of Vancouver, once valued at about $31 million, had also resulted in the issuance of $31 million in tax receipts for the company by the Review Board. It was clearly a shock when Sotheby’s appraised the works at a fraction of that amount, valuing nine sculptures from the Collection at $200,000-300,000.

Apparently, as revealed in a radio interview with CBC reporter Jason Proctor, the sculptures had endured a riveting history. The pieces had been put up for sale numerous times since the 1960s, receiving offers ranging from several to about $40 million; they were never sold. As per Proctor, the brothers became estranged over the sculptures and divided the collection into two. Corporate House then offered $18 million for Paul’s nine sculptures on the condition that they were attributable to Michelangelo and that they could be appraised for that value in 1996. However, the attribution to Michelangelo could not be made conclusively, and consequently Corporate House acquired Paul’s set of sculptures in 1998 for an undisclosed amount, on the basis that the sculptures were important, unattributed works of the Renaissance era. Shortly following Peter’s death in 2003, Corporate House purchased the remainder of the nine sculptures, whereupon in 2006 they donated the entire collection to the Museum of Vancouver in return for a tax break.

According to Proctor, when Corporate House approached the Review Board regarding the donation to the Museum of Vancouver, they had contacted every expert eligible to verify the attribution to Michelangelo, but learned that it was not “tenable.” Interestingly, Proctor managed to track down two scholars who had been hired by Corporate House, neither of whom had attributed the works to Michelangelo. One of the scholars even concluded that the sculptures were most likely the works of Van der Shardt but he was specifically asked to forgo writing a report about it.

Proctor reveals that the Review Board rejected the initial valuation made by Corporate House for $55 million and later accepted a second valuation based on independent appraisals, in the total fair market value (as defined by the Board) of $31 million for all eighteen figures. Although the appraisals are not made public, the Vancouver Sun reports that Nancy Noble (CEO, Museum of Vancouver) suspects that the sculptures may have been attributed to Michelangelo given the “enormous valuations.”

Source: Center for Art Law