Artist Jean Arp’s Works Presented to French Collection After Customs Nab

PARIS (Agence France-Presse)—More than 140 artworks by French surrealist Jean Arp seized by customs officials 10 years ago were ceremoniously handed over to be part of France’s national art collections on Dec. 12.

The works, 114 plaster casts and 32 reliefs of varying sizes by the sculptor, painter and poet were seized by northern French customs authorities in May 1996 on their way to Germany.

Lacking the necessary authorization for export, the pieces became the subject of a lengthy wrangle during which their “historic” character was recognized, and eventually became the property of the French customs administration.

At an official handover ceremony held at the Pompidou, Paris’ mecca of modern art, the custom’s authority’s director general Francois Mongin handed the collection over to national museum chiefs.

Twenty pieces are currently exhibited at the Pompidou and will later move to the Arp Foundation in Clamart, in the southwestern suburbs of Paris, where about 60 works are already at the artist’s studio where they were first created.

Arp, who was also a founding member of the Dada movement in Zurich, died in 1966.