Museum directors and other art experts cried out: in January 2019, Princess Christina wanted to have a drawing by the southern Dutch grandmaster Peter Paul Rubens auctioned in New York. Irreplaceable and indispensable national heritage threatened to fall into the hands of an oil sheik or American hedge fund trader.
The appeal to the royal family and the government was unsuccessful. The drawing was not included in the register of protected cultural objects that are only allowed to go abroad with ministerial permission. And the then minister Van Engelshoven was not in favor of an urgent indication in that register.
An attempt by Museum Boijmans to still acquire the drawing at the auction only increased the proceeds for the princess. Despite millions of support from the National Purchase Fund, an American private equity billionaire trumped the museum; he bought the drawing for $8.2 million.
Also read: Royal family to auction part of art collection
After the rumor about the Rubens, the Rutte cabinet had had enough. For three years in a row, revelations about secret art sales by the Oranges had embarrassed the cabinet. A government committee led by former minister Alexander Pechtold was tasked with investigating whether privately owned cultural heritage needed better protection.
The Pechtold Commission recommended a more active protection policy. That recommendation in turn led to the Collection Netherlands Committee chaired by Sybrand van Haersma Buma, the mayor of Leeuwarden. Although the Buma Committee issued an interim recommendation a year ago, State Secretary Gunay Uslu (Culture and Media, D66) received the final advisory report on Monday morning, called Irreplaceable & Indispensable†
Dynamic Collection Netherlands
The committee proposes a radically different and much more active protection policy. The aforementioned register may disappear because such a rigid canon does not fit in well with the desired dynamic Dutch Collection. According to the committee, this collection is not a physically demarcated collection of cultural goods, but a cultural concept that is always evolving.
According to the report, the collection should “provide a picture of the richness, complexity and diversity of the Dutch movable cultural heritage”. Only old paintings and antique, often religious objects are now in the register of protected cultural objects, also for art between twenty and fifty years old with a threshold value of EUR 750,000, the committee advocates protection rules.
The Committee recommends a national export license system instead of the register and the unrest and uncertainty-causing practice of (urgent) indications. Such a system would not only lead to permanent government involvement and clarity with the owners of the cultural objects, but it would also close the most important gap in the current permit system, according to the committee. Namely the lack of supervision of movements of cultural objects within the European Union.
The Committee attaches a consequence to a new export licensing system. If the government does not issue an export license because the cultural object in question is irreplaceable and has indispensable cultural-historical or social importance for the Netherlands Collection, then the government must in principle be prepared to purchase the cultural object in order to protect it against export. The government will then have a maximum of twelve months to make that purchase.
The government’s Museum Purchasing Fund now has too few resources for a decisive purchasing policy. The committee therefore recommends a one-off supplement to the fund to 50 million euros and then to invest 25 million annually.
Tax arrangements
The committee will also make proposals to increase private involvement in the protection of cultural objects. It does this, among other things, with attractive tax schemes.
For example, the favorable conditions with which heirs can pay succession by donating a cultural object to the State would also be when alive should already be possible. In concrete terms: by donating a work of art deemed indispensable to the Netherlands Collection to the State, the owner would be allowed to deduct 120 percent of the value from his income tax to be paid.
The Committee also proposes to broaden the Gift Act to include gifts intended for purchases for the Netherlands Collection. Now private individuals are allowed to multiply gifts of up to 5,000 euros to cultural ANBIs such as museums by 1.25 and deduct that amount from their income tax. Companies may even deduct 1.5 times the amount of such a gift in their corporate tax return.
The committee recommends lifting the limit of 5,000 euros for the surcharges for the purchase of cultural objects that have been assessed as irreplaceable and indispensable for the Netherlands Collection. Because the art market is so dynamic, the Committee thinks it would be wise to bundle such donations in a fund, so that action can be taken quickly if haste is required.
Also read: Rembrandt and the Rijksmuseum, that generates generosity
Participation construction
Finally, the committee advocates making a participation construction possible for the purchase of important cultural objects for the Netherlands Collection. In such a construction, private individuals jointly purchase a cultural object under favorable tax conditions. After the death of the (shared) owner, the object reverts to the State. The heirs can then apply the succession scheme. They may deduct 120 percent of the value of the gift from the inheritance tax.
Spicy: when the Rijksmuseum made it clear to the De Rothschild family and the French Ministry of Culture in 2018 that the The Standard Bearer van Rembrandt, the museum was already quietly exploring the possibility of such a participation construction. In NRC Art consultant Johan Bosch van Rosenthal already called this new tax structure “a wonderful arrangement for the very wealthy”. Bosch even indicated that such a succession scheme for one very elderly billionaire could already be a reason to buy such a precious work of art as the standard bearer to give to the State.
A national discussion like in January, when the government had to contribute 150 million to enable the purchase of the Rembrandt portrait, could thus be avoided. Private individuals can then lend a helping hand in the case of new works of art that exceed the scope of the Museaal Aankoopfonds in terms of price.
Also read the interview with Sybrand van Haersma Buma, Chairman of the Netherlands Collection Committee
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