Export Licences

A British maritime chart collection spanning 200 years has been temporarily blocked from export to give UK museums the chance to raise funds to keep it in the country.

Half a dozen artworks were saved for the nation in the past year and are on display at museums across the UK.

Yorkshire museum needs the final £600,000 by August 27 to save a Barbara Hepworth sculpture

Museum and Art Fund launch fundraising to save Barbara Hepworth sculpture

A rare Anglo-Saxon gold and garnet panel bought at a Spink auction last year and blocked from export will stay in the UK after a successful crowdfunding campaign by a local history trust.

A temporary export bar has been placed on a painting of the Virgin Mary by Sandro Botticelli valued at £10.2m.

A rare Anglo-Saxon gold and garnet panel has been blocked from export from the UK after it was bought at auction at Spink in September last year.

An export bar has been placed on a set of highly decorated 17th century panels that sold at Sotheby’s last year for £1.62m.

A unique sculpture by Dame Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975) has been blocked from export following its sale at Christie’s in London earlier this year.

The UK government has placed a temporary export bar on two Roman mosaics dating from the fourth century AD. Together they are valued at £560,000.

Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum has acquired a Fra Angelico (fl.1417-55) Crucifixion scene which was blocked from export following its sale at Christie’s last year.

A temporary export bar has been placed on a needlework sampler by an 11-year-old 19th century schoolgirl depicting the Menai Bridge in Anglesey.

A remarkable archive of newly discovered scientific papers by the mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing and his collaborator Donald Bayley has been temporarily blocked from export.

A temporary export bar has been placed on a British coin sold at auction that features the never-seen-before name Esunertos.

A temporary export block has been placed on Sir Ernest Shackleton’s polar medal in the hope a buyer in the UK can pay £1.7m.

Two rare artworks sold through auction houses Christie’s and Sotheby’s have been temporarily blocked from export to give UK museums a chance to buy the multi-million-pound treasures.