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History and Business

The origin of the ALR was The International Foundation for Art Research (IFAR), a not-for-profit organisation based in New York. In an attempt to deter international art theft, IFAR established an art theft archive in 1976 and began publishing the “Stolen Art Alert”.

Ten years later, the magnitude of the problem was manifested by the fact that IFAR had over 20 000 manual records. While IFAR had been very successful in recording the details of losses, it was apparent that recoveries would only materialise if such records could be computerised and the database made available to worldwide law enforcement agencies and diligently searched against auctions and public art fairs. Substantial capital investment and a corporate vehicle were necessary.

The ALR was first established in London in 1991. Its founding shareholders included major businesses from both the insurance and art industries. Subsequently offices in New York, Cologne, Amsterdam and recently Paris have been established so as to cater for an expanding number of searches made on the database.

The ALR is now the world’s largest private database of lost and stolen art, antiques and collectables. Its range of services includes item registration, search and recovery services to collectors, the art trade, insurers and worldwide law enforcement agencies. These services are efficiently delivered by employing state of the art IT technology and a team of specially trained professional art historians. The worldwide team has been deliberately constructed so as to offer a range of language capabilities as well as specialities (modern art, old masters, antiquities).

Conceptually, there are two aspects to the business.

First, by encouraging both the registration of all items of valuable possessions on the database and also the expansion of checking searches, the ALR acts as a significant deterrent on the theft of art. Criminals are now well aware of the risk, which they face in trying to sell on stolen pieces of art.  

Second, by operating a due diligence service to sellers of art and also being the worldwide focus for any suspicion of illegitimate ownership, the ALR operates a recovery service to return works of art to their rightful owners. In recent years, the service has been extended to negotiate compensation to the victims of art theft and a legitimising of current ownership. 

The ALR’s pre-eminence in the field of stolen art has allowed the business to be instrumental in the recovery of over £160m ($320m, €230m) worth of stolen items.

Highlights of this excellent and improving record have been: