The painting by Josef Šíma "Leda with a Swan" was sold for 14.6 million

Prague - The painting by Josef Šíma "Léda with a Swan" was auctioned today in Prague for 14.6 million crowns, making it the third most expensive artwork sold at a domestic auction. It was initially valued at 2.8 million crowns. A significant increase from the starting price was also recorded at the Art Prague Gallery for the painting "Daisies" by Antonín Procházka, whose price rose from 4.5 million to 10.1 million crowns. Procházka also made it onto the list of the ten most expensive sold artworks.
    Šíma and Procházka belong to a collection of works that have been auctioned at the Art Prague Gallery over the past several years. They were purchased by an American collector, but the state subsequently declared the works as cultural heritage, preventing him from taking them out of the country. The paintings were therefore offered for sale again.
    Similarly, today the painting "Foot Bath" by Josef Čapek was auctioned. It sold for 7.9 million crowns, with a starting price of five million. In 2006, it sold for 9.3 million crowns and held the record for the most expensive sold artwork at Czech auctions for half a year. At that time, it was valued at 930,000 crowns.
    The cultural heritage designation includes "Still Life with Artichoke and Mandolin" by Emil Filla. It was auctioned last year for 5.2 million crowns by the same collector. Today, it had a starting price of 4.5 million crowns, and the new owner paid 5.6 million crowns for it. Another painting by Emil Filla, "Still Life with Goblet and Egyptians," was auctioned today for 1.9 million crowns.
    The most expensive work by Josef Čapek sold at a domestic auction remains "Girl in a Pink Dress," which sold for 12 million crowns last year. It was also auctioned by the Art Prague Gallery. The most expensive work by Filla remains "Girl with Mandolin," which sold this spring for 11 million crowns.
    Vladimír Neubert, the owner of the Art Prague Gallery, and the original owner of the works, American collector Peter Schwartz, aimed to draw attention to the state’s cultural policy regarding the export of artworks through this re-auction. They believe it is unjust to the owners of the works; in other European countries, artworks commonly change ownership across borders, and no one is surprised that the art of famous authors does not permanently stay in their country of origin. "If a state gallery is interested in a work, it can exercise its right of first refusal; the Czech state is not interested in its own paintings, it only enforces an export ban,” says the gallerist.
    The Czech Republic tries to prevent significant works from being exported en masse with the export ban - this happened, for example, in the case of sacred monuments that disappeared from churches in the early 90s and were massively transported and sold on the black market.
    If a foreign collector knew that a work in the Czech Republic is or could be declared a cultural heritage, they would probably not buy it. Neubert told ČTK that for works of Czech modernity, it is never verified during auctions whether they are cultural heritage; such a procedure is common for old or sacred art. "The works became cultural heritage only after the auction; I believe this is the reluctance of officials,” Neubert stated. In the case of Filla's painting, he considers it a precedent, and it has reportedly not happened to the works of Josef Čapek so far, even though dozens were sold from restitution at the end of the 90s.
    However, there are also cases where works from the early 20th century were sold with the status of cultural heritage - for instance, the painting by František Kupka "Élévation (Heights) IV," which has held the domestic auction record for almost a year with a achieved price of 22.1 million crowns since last October. Thus, the painting is likely to adorn some domestic collection.
    Objections from owners that the designation is purposeful, to prevent export, without the object showing signs of heritage, are common according to the Ministry of Culture, but rarely justified. The procedure for declaring objects as heritage is described on the Ministry’s website, and everyone has the opportunity to familiarize themselves with it.