Following the case of the Nancy Wiener Seated Buddha, the Singapore Asian Civilisations Museum and the National Heritage Board of Singapore are reportedly suing a Madison Avenue art dealer for reimbursement of the $1.4 million purchase price which between 1997 and 2010 they paid for antiquities of apparently questionable provenance. The case against 'Art of the Past Inc.' (run by Subhash Kapoor) is being heard in Manhattan Supreme Court. The case is based on the accusation that the museum was induced =to buy the antiquities "by making misrepresentations and false assurances concerning the history, title, and provenance of the antiquities". The board and museum note that the defendants had given them letters of guarantee and provenance. Those letters promised that "'if in the future the verity of either their provenance or authenticity is legally questioned and found to be incorrect,' the defendants promised to reimburse the Asian Civilisations Museum for the cost paid by the plaintiff for the artwork purchased from the defendants," the complaint states.
A now-defunct website for Kapoor's Upper East Side gallery, Art of the Past, at 1242 Madison Avenue, had touted many prominent museums among its clients, the Times had said, noting that the "list includes the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Calif.; and the Smithsonian Institution's Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery in Washington."Barbara Leonard, 'Museum Sues Subject of Theft Trial in India' Courthouse News Service March 19, 2015.
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