Bender Ciccotto retained by world-renowned artist
In 2012, Bender Ciccotto was retained by a world-renowned artist to provide consulting services. At this time, the artist and his company had millions of dollars of defaulted bank debt, was technically insolvent, and could not pay its monthly bills. The 2008 worldwide economic collapse had devasted his business and affected his entire family.
Very early in Bender Ciccotto’ s engagement, the artist’s company owned 30,000 sq ft warehouse containing most of the artists life’s work was severely damaged from Super-storm Sandy from several feet of flooding. More than one hundred and fifty thousand items of artwork, memorabilia, and collectibles were damaged thereby creating the largest art insurance claim in the world at this time. Reuters news reported the art claim’s value at more than $300,000,000.
We were part of the team that was brought in to provide numerous services which included segregating the damaged and undamaged art; documenting the damaged artwork; coordinating the art rescue efforts while submitting progress reports to the insurance companies. During the time from October 29, 2012, the date of the storm, to August of 2018, when the first insurance award of $49,000,000 was received, Bender Ciccotto provided on-going multiple and critical services to these efforts.
The insurance companies initially offered $3,000,000 in full settlement of the claim and even after six years of multiple reviews and appraisals by art experts, appraisers, and conservators, the insurance companies continued to value the entire insurance claim at less than $10,000,000. After the first insurance award of $49,000,000 was received, Bender Ciccotto was instrumental in helping the company bring a lawsuit against the insurance companies. The lawsuit was seeking the proper value of this claim and the awarding of additional insurance proceeds.
During our engagement, we assisted the artist and his company in instituting inventory location and control procedures; repairing the damage to the warehouse including sanitization and reorganization of the artwork stored within; and devising a tax strategy to help defer income taxes on millions of dollars of insurance company advances.
We also provided consulting services which helped the artist to implement new business deals with the Estates for Frank Sinatra and Marilyn Monroe; major sport teams and their stars; AARP; The Voice: Morning Joe; Taylor Swift, and others. Large NYC promotions were held at the Citi Center and other locations along with a major advertising campaign.
Bender Ciccotto also assisted the Federal Bureau of Investigation in identifying and closing a multi-milliondollar fraudulent art ring which had been eroding the company’s sales.
During our seven-year engagement, the artist and his company recorded record sales and other income and profits, thereby eliminating its debt, and providing tens of millions of dollars to the artist and his family.
