Following the Next Steps conference in Ghana, which was designed to turn the March 2026 United Nations declaration recognising African enslavement as “the gravest crime against humanity” into actionable commitments, Germany and the Netherlands agreed to return 2,000 culturally significant artefacts to Ghana. Ambassadors from both countries presented a catalogue to the President of Ghana, John Dramani Mahama, detailing the items they intend to return, although it remains unclear what the 2,000 objects comprise. More details on the works, and plans for their display in Ghana are expected to be set out in due time. The return of these artefacts comes as international calls for the return of African cultural property removed during the colonial period intensify. Read more here. [NPG]

A watercolour by Cézanne, exhibited by Fondation Beyeler as part of its Art Basel exhibition this June, has been identified by the sole surviving heir of the Jewish businessman Gustav Schweitzer as having been lost due to Nazi persecution. The painting, Montagne Sainte-Victoire, was on temporary loan to the Fondation from an unnamed private collector in the United States. Using documents from the Basel public archives, provenance researcher Willi Korte, acting on behalf of Schweitzer’s heir, discovered that the work had been loaned by Schweitzer to Basel’s Kunsthalle for a 1936 exhibition before being returned to his Paris residence in 1939. According to Korte, its subsequent disappearance from Schweitzer’s ownership “means it was either sold under duress after Schweitzer had fled Germany, or it was looted in Nazi-occupied territory.” Schweitzer’s heir, together with other experts, called on Fondation Beyeler to retain the painting rather than return it to its current owner and to act as a mediator between the two parties. The Fondation declined. Read more here. [NPG]

The final report from the Advisory Committee on the Restitution and Repatriation of Cultural Heritage, originally established by the Irish government in 2023, has been released and has received a government response. Patrick O’Donovan, the Irish Minister for Culture, has said that he will give the report’s recommendations his “full consideration” and intends to “bring a plan to the government to seek support for their implementation.” One of the panel’s central recommendations is the establishment of a dedicated Restitution and Repatriation Advisory Panel. Such a body would deal with issues ranging from colonial-era collections and Nazi-era spoliation to human remains and sacred objects. Further recommendations include government-funded provenance research and granting the Minister for Culture powers to direct or authorise restitutions. Read more here. [NPG]

Australian artist Jane Allan has faced scrutiny winning two prestigious prizes with paintings that have been accused of closely resembling works by other artists. Her 2022 Darling Portrait Prize finalist, Weight of the Mind’s Periapt, was acknowledged by the National Portrait Gallery as being “clearly influenced” by Jean-Michel Basquiat. More recently, her 2025 Doyles Art Award-winning painting, Seaside Explorers, was alleged to imitate Nicholas Harding’s Two Estuary Figures. The Doyles committee is investigating the matter, considering recovery of the $20,000 prize money and reviewing its judging process. Allan has not publicly commented on the allegations. Read more here. [NPG]

A UK cross-party parliamentary committee has released a new report which critiques the Department for Culture, Media and Sport for their lack of leadership in relation to artistic and cultural institutions. The Committee of Public Accounts found that the national museums and galleries of England were being left “vulnerable” to both digital and physical security threats, and expressed concerns that the government does not properly monitor the effectiveness of their provided finances, highlighting an overall lack of initiative in supporting these institutions. In response to the Committee’s inquiry about removing the standard of free admission to these museums and galleries, the DCMS also mentioned planning to look into potentially charging international visitors. Read more here. [LR]

As of June 30, 93% of the Guggenheim Museum’s union membership is reported to have voted in favor of authorizing a strike. Union members cite continuing concerns following layoffs from 2025 which they found to be poorly managed, motivating them to seek better security provisions and severance pay. Following the conclusion of the first contract between the union and the Guggenheim which was ratified in August 2023 for a period of 2.5 years, negotiations have been ongoing since December to approve a second contract. In response to the museum’s recent offers, union members feel the proposed contracts do not properly account for inflation nor address their concerns of job security. Read more here. [LR]

Avant-Garde Lawyers, a law firm focused on advocacy for artists, has filed a complaint with the Spanish Comisión Nacional de los Mercados y la Competencia on behalf of artist and activist Emma Shapiro. This action follows Meta, the parent company of Facebook, suspending and terminating Shapiro’s account, which she used for her long-running project, Exposure Therapy, that discusses and advocates against gendered censorship. The suspension and removal of Ms. Shapiro’s account were based on “account integrity” but did not specify any actions typically associated with such a decision, like impersonation or spamming. The video that seemingly prompted the suspension featured a short clip of a metal pole covered in stickers, including some that depicted human nipples. The complaint filed by Avant-Garde Lawyers alleges that Meta failed to provide a clear statement of reasons for its suspension and termination decisions and also failed to act in a proportionate manner when imposing the suspension and account termination. Read more here. [IS]

A Rotterdam court has held that the museum failed to substantiate the claims behind the July 2025 dismissal of Birgit Donker and ordered a compensation €400,000 to be paid to the former director. Donker had been let go after a Dutch newspaper had reported anonymous allegations that she had cultivated a negative culture and work environment, claims that the Dutch Council for Journalism later deemed “unverifiable and tendentious.” As the court found the museum’s supervisory board could not evidence these assertions, the institution was also ordered to publish a rectification. The museum has commented in a statement that it is not planning on appealing the judgement, as the case has “weighed heavily on them.” Read more here [EA]

Police in Vilnius, Lithuania, have opened a criminal investigation following a brazen daytime theft at the Radvilas Palace Art Museum. On June 28th, an unknown suspect stole an original photograph by prominent Kharkiv artist Boris Mikhailov. The stolen artwork belongs to Mikhailov’s famous 1993 series titled At Dusk and was a centerpiece of a visiting exhibition titled “Ukrainian Dreamers: The Kharkiv School of Photography.” Although museum security cameras caught the suspect on camera, the thief managed to escape the building before staff could stop him. Read more here. [SM]

On July 1, 2026, the citizen collective Defence of the Gelman Collection filed suit against Mexican cultural authorities seeking to terminate a January 2026 agreement that authorizes the collection to travel abroad on a renewable five-year loan. The agreement, signed with Banco Santander and the Zambrano family, would allow masterpieces by Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and other iconic Mexican modern artists to be part of an international tour. The plaintiffs argue that the agreement violates Mexican cultural heritage law and that the collection was improperly used as collateral for a reported $150 million personal loan. Although a federal court denied an emergency injunction to prevent the artworks’ departure on July 8, the broader lawsuit challenging the legality of the export agreement remains pending. Click here to sign the petition. Read more here. [SM]

On July 4, 2026, the White House Domestic Policy Council released a 162-page report accusing the Smithsonian Institution of promoting an” anti-white” ideology through its exhibitions and educational materials. While the report primarily targets the National Museum of American History, it also criticizes the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s exhibition The Shape of Power: Stories of Race and American Sculpture. The report marks the latest effort by the Trump administration to influence the Smithsonian’s interpretation of American history. Read more here. [SM]

On July 9, 2026, London’s Southwark Crown Court dismissed charges against Hauser & Wirth and shipping company Artay Rauchwerger Solomons over the alleged sale and shipment of a George Condo work to a person connected with Russia. The court ruled that prosecutors had not provided sufficient evidence that the buyer was a Russian resident at the time of the transaction. The case marked the first known corporate prosecution under the U.K. Russia Sanctions Regulations involving the supply of luxury goods. Read more here. [SM]

With the start of the new fiscal year on July 1, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and the City Council announced a historic $323.8 million investment in the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Included in the department’s Fiscal Year 2027 budget, the funding represents a nearly 7% increase over the previous year. The budget also establishes a new “Cultural Stability Fund,” providing $10 million annually to struggling cultural organizations through 2029. In the budget announcement, Mayor Mamdani described the investment as part of his administration’s broader effort to make New York City more affordable. Read more here. [SBM]

The criminal investigation into the forgery scheme targeting Canadian Indigenous artist Norval Morrisseau has encountered a further setback. The sentencing hearing of Jeffrey Cowan, the last of eight individuals convicted in connection with the forgery operation, was interrupted after new evidence was introduced. During the hearing, Morrisseau expert John Zemanovich testified before the Superior Court that the artist’s children were involved in the production of counterfeits and were crucial to the operation’s success. In his statement, Zemanovich suggested that there could be anywhere from 5,000 to 7,000 forgeries in circulation and that without the help of Morrisseau’s children, such a figure would have been unattainable. Read more here.  [VC]

One of Vincent Van Gogh’s most important paintings, Hôpital Saint-Paul à Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, housed at the Musée d’Orsay, has become the subject of a restitution claim. The claim was brought by an heir of a Jewish collector whose works were seized or sold under Nazi persecution during the Second World War. Given the nature of the claim, the Musée d’Orsay will be expected to carry out an extensive examination of the painting’s ownership history to determine whether the work was obtained legitimately. The painting, which sees thousands of visitors each year at the Musée d’Orsay, is estimated to be worth $50 million. Read more here. [VC]

France’s Musée Guimet of Asian Arts, where roughly a third of the collection consists of Chinese artefacts, has made a historic promise. If any of its Chinese artefacts are definitively shown to have been looted, they will be repatriated within 24 hours. This program was announced by Yannick Linz himself, the director of the Musée Guimet. The promise comes in the wake of France’s legislative steps to remedy historical injustices. On April 13, the French Legislative Assembly unanimously passed a bill that will make the process of returning cultural artefacts looted during the colonial era more efficient. As young people have increasingly called upon Museums to address the colonial legacies of their collections, these decisions mark an important step towards achieving justice. Read more here. [VC]

The American Museum of Natural History is planning to revise its inventory of Native American remains to include more than 2,700 hair samples. The clippings were originally compiled for an installation at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago and resurfaced at the Museum of Natural History in the 1990s. At the time the clippings were rediscovered, federal law already required the repatriation of Native American remains to their communities, but many institutions interpreted the law to exclude hair. Despite recent efforts to advance consultation and repatriation, the Museum’s lack of transparency regarding the possession of these remains has undermined trust with many communities. The Museum could face up to $23 million in federal fines for not disclosing its possession of hair samples sooner. Read more here. [VC]

Patricia Leahy, the last descendant of the wealthy Austrian Lieser family, claims that im Kinsky auction house in Vienna changed the name of a painting to disguise its illicit provenance. The work, titled Portrait of Fräulein Margarethe Lieser, was taken from the Lieser family in 1938 by the Nazis and remained missing until it reappeared at the auction house in 2024. When it was auctioned, the painting no longer had Margarethe in the title and possessed false provenance. According to the current owner, an external settlement was reached in 2023 before it was offered at auction. However, Leahy alleges she was never included in negotiations. The work, which has been deemed one of Klimt’s late masterpieces, is valued at over $100 million. Read more here. [VC]

On June 30, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, Artificial Intelligence, and the Internet held a hearing, “A Midlife Crisis? IP and the Internet After 40,” on the changes and challenges IP law has faced in the Internet era. Topics included piracy, copyright theft, and abusive digital replicas. Ranking Member Rep. Hank Johnson said, “It is imperative we view harms to creators as the symptom of a more pernicious disease. The question we should be asking ourselves is: Are the innovations before us serving the American people? Or do they exclusively benefit a small handful of the wealthiest, most powerful corporations and individuals in human history?” Read Johnson’s full opening remarks here, and watch the hearing here. [CI]

After an attempt to sell three counterfeit ancient greek figurines and a statuette through Sotheby’s London, Andrew Crowley, has been sentenced to two years in prison. The Bristol man pleaded guilty to fraud by false representation having previously claimed to have inherited the objects from his late grandfather, and presenting forged provenance documents to the auction house. The police investigation arose from Sotheby’s flagging inconsistencies in the paperwork in 2022. Among other findings forensic analysis uncovered that the invoices provided from an alleged 1976 sale had been in fact produced using a typeface not developed until 25 years later, ascertaining they were fabricated. The case has been cited as an example of art market due diligence done right, highlighting the importance of provenance research before works enter the market. Read more here. [EA]

The Italian Parliament has made waves for proposing Bill 2834, a piece of legislation focused on the “regulation of the procedures for the restitution of works of art stolen or sold due to racial persecution.” The law would create a formal process through which the Italian government could return Jewish-owned art and cultural property taken by the Nazi and Italian Fascist regimes between 1933 and 1945. If it ultimately passes, this legislation would be significant for the many suspectedly looted works currently residing in Italy’s public collections. Read more here. [HG]

Jeffrey Ying has been sentenced in a California court for various theft charges connected to a series of manuscript heists in the UCLA rare books collection. Over the course of years, rare Chinese manuscripts were checked out under fabricated aliases and replaced with false replicas. According to court documents, Ying would travel to China following these switches. The fate of the stolen manuscripts is still unknown. Ying was sentenced to one year of home confinement. Read more here. [HG]