Picasso painting valued at $ 27 million is seized during attempted export – The Universe

The painting “Head of a Young Woman” by Pablo Picasso, owned by banker Jaime Botin, of an estimated value of over 25 million euros (27.23 million dollars, approximately) and declared by the authorities inexportable Spanish, was seized last Friday July 31 last in a boat anchored on the island of Corsica, announced Tuesday the French Customs.

A “attempted export to Switzerland from the customs office Bastia (Corsica northeast) of a Picasso painting, “Head of a Young Woman ”, last Thursday, attracted the attention of French officials said French customs in a statement.

Up to date Next, customs agents Calvi (northwest of the Mediterranean island) “presented themselves aboard the ship carrying the work, docked in the marina” of the Corsican city, and called the “documents relating to the situation of the painting” continues the text.

“The captain could only present an evaluation of the work and an act of judgment written in Spanish language, May 2015, emanating from the Audiencia Spanish national and confirmed that it was a Spanish national treasure that in no case could go to Spain. “

The table,” from an estimated more than 25 million euros ” according to the Customs Service, is owned by Jaime Botin, famous Spanish banker whose family participated in 1857 in the founding of Banco Santander, today first Spanish banking group.

Jaime Botin, 79, vice president Santander between 1999 and 2004, maximum current shareholder of Bankinter, he was not aboard the ship, the British flag and owned by a company which is a shareholder, he told AFP a spokesman for the office.

The export application registered in Bastia not listed in his name, he said also.

A first application was filed in December 2012 in Spain to permanently country export the table, bound for London.

The Minister of Education, Culture and Sports then objected and in 2015 the High Court upheld the “inexportabilidad” of the work belong to the “cultural assets” that have no right to leave the country.

The French authorities now expect the eventual claim of Spain to recover the work, belonging to the period of the Malaga painter, who was then 24, in the town of Lleida Gósol (one hundred paintings the summer of 1906), crucial for the further development of Cubism. (I)