Compensation ruled for counterfeit exhibition

ISTANBUL

The Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Rectorate has won a lawsuit against an ad agency filed in 2023 regarding the allegation that 56 artworks exhibited in the Joan Miro Exhibition were counterfeit, with a compensation of 16,505 Turkish Liras awarded.

The agency submitted a request to the university on Oct. 2, 2013, to exhibit the works of Spanish artist Joan Miro, who died in 1983. On Oct. 31, 2013, the university approved the exhibition of the artist's works.

About a month after the opening of the exhibition, Rose Maria Malet, the representative of the Miro Foundation in Barcelona, Spain, sent an email to the Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University.

According to the allegations, Malet stated that the works on display were fake and asked for the exhibition to be closed as soon as possible. After an expert examination, it was revealed that the pencil signatures claimed to be Miro's were counterfeit. The university administration also shut down the exhibition.

At the final hearing of the case, which has been in court for 10 years, the court accepted the lawsuit of the Rectorate of Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University and ordered the defendant agency to pay a total of 16,505 liras in compensation, 11,505 liras in material damages and 5,000 liras in non-pecuniary damages.

The court ordered the ad agency to pay this compensation to the university rectorate with 10 years of interest.

Another case was opened by the organizer of the exhibition, ad agency, in 2016 against the owner of the collection, Emre Sefer.

Sefer was found guilty of fraud and forgery of official documents, receiving four years and six months in jail as well as a fine of 40,000 liras.