Who's Art Is It Anyway?

The fight over who owns art might have just gone nuclear, and Vincent van Gogh’s 1888 painting The Night Cafe (shown above) is at the center of it. The descendents of the Russian industrialist who bought the painting in 1908, only to see Soviet Russia “nationalize” the painting and sell it in the 1930s, are demanding that Yale University, which received the painting as a bequest in the 1960s, give it back. Perhaps $20 billion in art treasures hangs in the balance. Who is right? What does this mean for the public, who can only stand on the sidelines as masterpieces have their day in court? Please click over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Who's Art Is It Anyway?"