July 8, 2026
Diego Rivera, Portrait of Natasha Gelman, 1943
By Paula Gutierrez de Villasante
The controversy surrounding one of the most historically significant and valuable collections of modern Mexican art, which currently finds itself in a legal limbo that could threaten the country’s cultural heritage.
A Collection on the Move
Walking along Avenida Reforma towards the Modern Art Museum of Mexico City, one approaches an unusual homecoming: emblematic works from the renowned Gelman Collection, on view from February 17th to July 19th 2026. After nearly two decades out of sight, they reappear, briefly, for the Mexican public, in what feels less like a return than a tightly bounded five-month engagement.
Inside the museum, tall windows open onto the sheltering canopy of Chapultepec Park. Yet that calm is countered by the air of Mexico’s art community, indignant, concerned, and wary, now unusually aligned and united in questioning the opacity that has long surrounded the collection’s stewardship. At the heart of these concerns, lies a broader question: What happens when artworks of profound national importance become assets within the financial and legal structures? The Gelman Collection offers a clear case study between cultural heritage, private property, and the financialization of art.
The Gelmans and Their Collection
To grasp the value of the works that make up the collection, it is necessary to immerse oneself in the historical context of the first half of the twentieth century. Mexico was in its post-revolutionary moment, amid an artistic boom driven in large part by José Vasconcelos, “…one of the greatest ideologists of the essence and identity of Ibero-America in the worldwide panorama…”, during his tenure as Secretary of Public Education (1921–1924). His sweeping cultural and educational reform promoted the arts as tools for social cohesion, seeking to unify the country through a renewed celebration of Mexican identity. Shaped by both domestic transformation and global political currents, this vision had a profound impact and push on the artists of the period, like the three great muralists David Alfaro Siqueiros, José Clemente Orozco, and Diego Rivera, to name a few; whose works carry an important social national weight by reflecting the aftermath of the Mexican Revolution, the social struggles, and the redefining of the ideals of a post-revolutionary state. It was precisely during this period, from the 1920s through the 1950s, that the Mexican Golden Age of the arts flourished, not only in muralism, but in painting, music, sculpture and the film industry.
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| Diego Rivera, The History of Mexico (detail depicting Emiliano Zapata), 1935, mural, Palacio Nacional, Mexico City | José Clemente Orozco, Barricada, 1931, Mexico City. |
At the same time, across the Atlantic, Europe was gripped by the mounting tensions between the First and Second World Wars. It was in the late 1930s that Jacques Gelman, born in the Russian Empire into an affluent Jewish family that fled after the 1917 Russian Revolution to Germany, settled in Mexico. A decade later, in 1940, Natasha Zahalka—born in Moravia, then part of Czechoslovakia—came to Mexico, where she would meet the man who would become not only her fourth husband, but also her intellectual counterpart.
Jacques Gelman became a successful film maker, among other projects he championed the career of the legendary Mexican comedian “Cantinflas.” Ultimately Gelmans build the fortune that would allow them to collect master art works from artists, some also friends, like Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siquerios, Clemente Orozco, Rufino Tamayo, Maria Izquierdo, and Leonora Carrington.
Gelmans had no children. After Jacques Gelman’s death on July 25, 1986, Natasha Gelman inherited the entire art Gelman collection and estate. In August 1993, she signed a Mexican will before Public Notary No. 103 in Mexico City, who certified that she was of sound mind and full legal capacity, designating her close friend and art advisor, the American curator Robert R. Littman, as her will’s executor. In March 1995, a neurologist concluded that Natasha suffered from progressive Alzheimer’s disease and lacked testamentary capacity. Natasha Gelman died three years later on May 2, 1998. Ever since, the notarial process and the validity of the testament have been the subject of legal controversy; the testament has never been public and in 2013 the Public Notary no. 103 related of Natasha’s will, was shot and killed in Mexico City.
After the death of Natasha Gelman, Robert Littman established the Vergel Foundation in 1999 in the United States as the private entity responsible for administering and preserving the Gelman Collection. The European portion of the collection was donated by Natasha to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1998. For the Mexican portion of 156 masterpieces, Natasha stipulated that the works were to remain together and be exhibited at a private institution in Mexico. That has never happened. How Littman went from being executor of Gelman estate to owning the art collection also remains unclear.
In 2023, Littman sold the collection to Marcelo Zambrano Alanis, a board member of CEMEX, one of the biggest leading global construction materials companies, based in Monterrey, Mexico. Zambrano had no known history of being an art collector. According to press reports, he paid under $200 million, well below market rates, and financed the entire purchase through debt. Littman had previously attempted to sell the collection to the Mexican government for approximately $300 million, according to statements by the former director of the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (“INBAL”) to the newspaper Milenio. The government did not purchase it.
Sotheby’s Financial Services bundled the loan into a larger financial vehicle called Sotheby’s ArtFi Master Trust. A presale report by rating agency Morningstar DBRS, dated April 10, 2024, identified the Zambrano loan as a fixed-rate Art Equity Loan of $187.5 million dollars—the single largest obligation in a fund containing eighty-nine loans backed by over 2,800 works of art valued collectively at approximately $1.4 billion dollars. Frida Kahlo ranked among the most valuable artists in the fund, alongside Rembrandt, Warhol, Picasso, and Basquiat. Barclays, BNP Paribas, and Morgan Stanley structured the transaction.
In November 2024, Sotheby’s offered approximately thirty works from the Gelman Collection at auction in New York. The Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (INBAL) intervened and requested the withdrawal of a painting by María Izquierdo, to which Sotheby’s agreed. This situation clearly raises significant legal concerns , considering that the works of Maria Izquierdo were declared National Artistic monuments by Agreement 317 in 2002. That such works nonetheless advanced to a public auction exposes a troubling absence of oversight, no real examination of the authorized contents of the auction’s catalogue, and no meaningful background investigation appears to have practiced the public offering. The withdrawal occurred only because the INBAL intervened, not because any prior safeguard caught the irregularity, which suggests the works were offered for sale on the assumption that their protected status would go unnoticed.
Should there not be a thorough background and provenance investigation of the artworks before they are publicly and legally placed for auction? Did they think no one would notice
What is exactly a Nacional Artistic Monument under Mexican Law and according to the INBAL? What requirements must an artwork satisfy in order to be declared one, and what legal implications and protections does such designation entail?
Under Mexico’s Federal Law on Archeological, Artistic and historic Monuments and Zones (Ley Federal sobre Monumentos y Zonas Arqueológicos, Artísticos e Históricos), according to Article 33,
“…Artistic monuments are movable and immovable property possessing relevant aesthetic value.”…”
The same article establishes the criteria required for an artwork to be considered a national artistic monument, stating that the determination of “relevant aesthetic value” shall take into account the “…representativeness, insertion within a particular stylistic movement, degree of innovation, materials and techniques used, and other analogous characteristics…”
It also expressly provides that “Works by Mexican artists may be declared monuments regardless of where they were produced.” Additionally, “The declaration of monument may comprise the entire body of work of an artist or only part thereof.”12
This means that once an artwork is declared a national artistic monument by INBAL, it ceases to be treated merely as an ordinary private asset and instead becomes part of Mexico’s protected cultural patrimony, subject to special legal protections, governmental oversight, registration obligations, and restrictions concerning transfer, exportation, restoration, and commercialization. The ownership remains private.
Adding to this matter, all artistic oeuvres from Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, both private and public property, have been formally declared Artistic Monuments: Diego’s oeuvres by Decree published in the Federal Official Gazette on December 15, 1959, and Frida’s entire artistic works by Decree published in the Federal Official Gazette, in 1984.
From Executor to Bank Collateral
In January 2026, two additional forms replaced Sotheby’s with a new creditor: Banco Santander, one of the largest financial institutions in Spain. In less than twenty-four hours, one of the largest private collections of twentieth-century Mexican art had changed lenders. If the Zambrano family defaulted, would Banco Santander be entitled to foreclose on the collection and record it as a financial asset? Would this mean that part of the collection traveling to Spain could remain there for good in the event of default—thus contravening Natasha’s expressed wish that the collection always remain together and in Mexico? What has been considered a collection of artistic masterpieces now appears to be treated merely as a financial asset. It must not be ignored that art is of course always much more than a financial instrument—particularly in the case of National Artistic Monuments, whose historic and symbolic significance transcends commercial consideration.
On January 7th, 2026, a Collaboration Agreement was signed between INBAL, Banco Santander, and the Santander Foundation with the intention of “…management, coordination, and cultural outreach functions, without this agreement modifying in any way the ownership of the artworks or their legal status…” This agreement will remain in force for a term of five years, from January 7, 2026 to September 30, 2030.
Under the agreement, 40 artworks from the Gelman Collection will be transferred to a new space operated by the Santander Foundation for exhibition purposes, 30 of which are considered National Artistic Monuments.
As of May 6, neither the Mexican authorities nor Banco Santander have publicly disclosed the agreement. Its contents have only been known through public versions of the document obtained by the press, rather than through any official disclosure. The Agreement has generated significant political and social controversy in Mexico. Mexican legislators have urged the federal executive branch to disclose the document, and the matter has already been addressed during President Claudia Sheinbaum’s morning press conferences, in which she has consistently maintained that the agreement was executed in full compliance with all applicable legal requirements and safeguards, and that the artworks will ultimately be returned to Mexico.
The ongoing uncertainty stems largely from the opacity and the lack of transparency surrounding the agreement. It has been reported that the artworks are expected to return to Mexico sometime between 2028 and 2030. Although Mexican law does not establish a fixed maximum period for the temporary export of artistic monuments—leaving the determination to the discretion of the INBAL—administrative practice has consistently operated within two-year cycles tied to custom permits. The Collaboration Agreement appears to rely on this structure rather than establishing a definitive return date, it contemplates the renewal of those permits and the extension of the corresponding export authorizations. As a result, the duration of the artworks’ stay abroad remains uncertain, as successive renewals could potentially extend the export period beyond 2030.
Likewise, the artworks are intended to be exhibited in a new space for the Santander Foundation, which is currently still under construction. To validly execute the agreement involving the transfer of such delicate artworks, it is standard practice to first obtain and review the Facility Report for the venue where the works will be displayed to determine the lighting, temperature, humidity control, and other technical conditions for the safe preservation of the artworks. It is therefore difficult to see how the Agreement could have been validly executed without a Facility Report, given both the exceptional importance of the artworks and the fact that the venue itself does not yet exist.
Art, Debt, and the Borders of Heritage Law
The Gelman case reveals a new challenge for cultural heritage law: the financialization of nationally significant art. The controversy is not centered on theft or illicit exportation, but rather on the legal and ethical limits of treating declared National Artistic Monuments as financial assets within global markets.
The case exposes the insufficiency of actual legal frameworks, raising serious questions of whether Mexico’s declaration system offers genuine protection or merely the appearance of it. It demonstrates the urgent need for Mexico to reform and modernize its cultural heritage legislation and develop stronger mechanisms capable of protecting.
For now, the ultimate outcome of the controversy remains uncertain. Whether the collection will indeed return to Mexico and remain together remains to be seen.
About the Author
Paula Gutierrez de Villasante, Mexican lawyer with experience in cultural and administrative law, and a great passion for the arts and cultural heritage.
Suggested Readings
1. Ley Federal sobre Monumentos y Zonas Arqueológicos, Artísticos e Históricos, DOF May 6, 1972 (last amended 2026) — Mexico’s primary statutory framework for the protection of artistic monuments, available at: diputados.gob.mx.
2. Cascone, Sarah, Mexico’s Art Community Calls for Greater Transparency in Management of Treasured Collection, THE ART NEWSPAPER (Mar. 31, 2026), available at: https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2026/03/31/gelman-santander-collection-loans-mexico-spain-transparency-open-letters
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Disclaimer: This article is for educational purposes only and is not meant to provide legal advice. Readers should not construe or rely on any comment or statement in this article as legal advice. For legal advice, readers should seek a consultation with an attorney.
