Picasso painting seized on yacht taken to Madrid museum

[unhappycamper]

http://www.france24.com/en/20150812-picasso-painting-corsica-spain-national-treasure-legal-battle-botin



A woman inspects Picasso's 'Head of a Young Woman' in Corsica during the painting's handover to Spain

Picasso painting seized on yacht taken to Madrid museum
Latest update : 2015-08-12

A group of Spanish police, officials and art experts escorted a Picasso painting valued at €26.6 million to Spain on Tuesday after it was seized by French authorities in Corsica, but legal wrangling over the artwork is likely to continue.

The painting, which has been declared a “national treasure” in Spain, was flown to Madrid with a team that included Spanish military police, employees of the country’s culture ministry, an art restorer and an expert in packaging works of art from the Reina Sofia modern art museum.

Painted by Spanish-born Pablo Picasso in 1906, “Head of a Young Woman” was seized by French customs police on a yacht docked in Corsica last week, drawing attention to a running dispute between Spanish authorities and one of the country’s wealthiest men.

The work belongs to billionaire Jaime Botin, whose family founded and heads the powerful banking Santander Group. French customs agents seized the painting from a British-flagged vessel, also the property of Botin, halting what they said was an attempt to export it to Switzerland.