UK export bar on Picasso's piece expires

Picasso's Child With A Dove

flickr-IanBauer

A temporary bar on export of Picasso's Child With A Dove, issued by UK's Culture Minister Ed Vaizey in August, expires. It is hoped enough money is raised to keep the painting in the country.

Earlier this year, the Picasso's early work was sold by Christies auction house to an unknown buyer on behalf of the Aberconway family in Wales, who has owned it since 1947. It has been valued at estimated £50 million. 

Vaizey imposed the bar in hope that enough money can be raised to buy the painting back and keep it thus in the country. It has been on public display in Britain since the 1970s, when it was loaned out to the National Gallery in London. Since 2011, it has been on display at the Courtauld Gallery. 

"Child With a Dove is a much-loved painting whose iconic status; together with its long history in British collections... make it of outstanding importance to our national heritage," said a member of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest, Aidan Weston-Lewis.