Bad bargain: Couple who sold African mask worth €4.2m for €150 lose legal case
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A retired couple who sold an African mask for €150 to a second-hand goods dealer who went on to sell it for €4.2 million have lost a legal attempt to undo the deal.
The couple, in their 80s, said the dealer had paid them only a fraction of the true value of the 19th century carved wooden mask.
A court in Alès, southern France, ruled on Tuesday that the dealer had bought the mask in good faith and rejected the attempt to have the deal annulled.
“Their negligence and their casualness show the inexcusable nature of their request,” the judgment said.
Nor was there proof that the dealer “had prior knowledge of the singular value of the mask”. His own lawyer said that “he had no specific knowledge of African art”.
The court also rejected an application by the government of Gabon to annul the sale and have the mask returned to the country.
The couple had been clearing out their holiday home in the south of France when they came across the Fang mask from Gabon. The husband’s grandfather, who had been a colonial governor, had brought it to France.
After the dealer bought the mask he had it carbon-dated for €600 then put it up for sale at an auction house in Montpellier with bidding starting at €300,000.
The couple only became aware of the auction from a local newspaper report.
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