Kupka's Shape of Blue national heritage, must not leave CzechRep

Prague, Jan 9 (CTK) - Czech artist Frantisek Kupka's abstract painting The Shape of Blue (1913) which a foreign buyer auctioned off for a record 55.75 million crowns in Prague last April will continue to be a national heritage item and it cannot be permanently exported, Marketa Sevcikova told CTK Wednesday.

Sevcikova, spokeswoman for the Culture Ministry, said the ministry dismissed the gallery owner's remonstrance against previous verdicts.

She said no remedial measures against the latest decision exist.

"We will meet with the painting's buyer and we will see whether he will want to keep the work that has the status of national heritage in the Czech Republic," Vladimir Lekes, executive of Adolf Loos apartment and Gallery, that put up the painting for auction, told CTK Wednesday.

Lekes told CTK previously that the buyer wanted to loan the painting on a long-time basis for a permanent exhibition at Vienna's Belvedere.

Lekes said in the past he put the painting up for auction because the National Heritage Institute (NPU) told him it is not a national heritage item.

He also said repeatedly he would consider taking legal steps if the cultural heritage status of the painting were confirmed.

Kupka (1871-1957) was a founder of modern abstract painting. He spent a large part of his life in France where he also died.

The Shape of Blue was part of a collection of Czech entrepreneur and collector Jindrich Waldes, whose family gained it in restitution in the 1990s.

Waldes died in the Nazi concentration camp Buchenwald in 1941.

It was proposed to declare the Waldes collection national heritage, but some NPU experts say it is not clear whether the process of granting it the status has been completed.