Country Summary for AUSTRIA

Definitions

‘cultural good’ – has the same meaning as monument. (§1.11 MPA)

‘cultural object’ – is an object which

            1. is defined or classified by a Member State, either before or after its unlawful removal, as a national treasure within the meaning of Article 36 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), or

            2. is protected by the legislation of a State Party as part of its cultural heritage within the meaning of Articles 1, 4 and 5 of the UNESCO Convention and is recognisable as such without investing unreasonable effort or expense. (§2 RCOA)

 

‘holder’ - means the person holding the cultural object for third parties. (§5 RCOA)

‘member state’ -  means a member state of the European Union. (§5 RCOA)

‘monuments’ – means man-made immovable and movable objects (including remains and traces of creative human intervention and artificially constructed or moulded ground formations) of historic, artistic or other cultural significance, if, due to this significance, their preservation is in the public interest. This significance may be due to the objects per se, but may also arise due to their relationship to, or location in relation to, other objects. (§1.1 MPA)

‘national interest’ – has the same meaning as public interest. (§1.11 MPA)

‘objects liable to restitution’ – means those art objects and other movable cultural assets from Austrian federal museums and collections, including the collections of the Federal Administration of Moveable Objects (Bundesmobilienverwaltung), and other directly owned federal property that

            1. were the subject of restitution to their original owners or their heirs or were to be restituted under the regulations at the time and that became the property of the Federal State after 8 May 1945 in direct connection with proceedings under the provisions of the Federal Law on the Prohibition of Export of Objects of Historical, Artistic or Cultural Significance (StGBl. No. 90/1918) and that remain State property;

            2. that legally became the property of the State but that had been previously the object of a legal transaction or legal act under § 1 of the Federal Law on the Declaration of Annulment of Legal Transactions and Other Legal Acts Occurring During the German Occupation of Austria (BGBl. No. 106/1946) and are still State property;

                        2a. that legally became the property of the State but that had been the object of a legal transaction or legal act under § 1 of the Federal Law on the Declaration of Annulment of Legal Transactions and Other Legal Acts Occurring During the German Occupation of Austria (BGBl. No. 106/1946) between 30 January 1933 and 8 May 1945 in a territory of the German Reich outside the present Republic of Austria, that was comparable with legal transactions or legal acts taking place during the German occupation of Austria and are still State property;

            3. that were not returned to the original owners or their legal heirs on conclusion of restitution proceedings and without payment became the property of the State as abandoned goods and are still State property. (§1 ARA)

 

‘possessor’- means the person physically holding the cultural object on his own account. (§5 RCOA)

‘public collections’ - mean collections which are defined as public in accordance with the legislation of the requesting State, which are the property of the requesting State, of a local or regional authority within that requesting State, or of an institution situated on the territory of that requesting State, such institution being the property of, or significantly financed by, the requesting State or a local or regional authority. (§5 RCOA)

‘public interest’ – preservation is in the public interest if, from a supraregional or, for the time being, only a regional (local) point of view, the monument is a cultural good, the loss of which would amount to an impairment of the stock of Austrian cultural goods as a whole with respect to quality as well as sufficient abundance, diversity and distribution. Furthermore, it is fundamental whether (and to what extent) the preservation of the monument would enable historic documentation. (§1.2 MPA)

‘preservation’ – of monuments means protection from destruction, alteration or being dispatched abroad. (§1.1 MPA)

‘requesting state’ - means the member state or state party from whose territory the cultural object was unlawfully removed. (§5 RCOA)

‘requested state’ - means the member state or state party in whose territory a cultural object, which has been unlawfully removed, is located. (§5 RCOA)

‘return’ - means the return of the cultural object to the territory of the requesting State. (§5 RCOA)

‘religious institutions’ - means legally recognised churches or religious communities including their institutions, officially registered religious confessional communities and equivalent institutions in a Member State or State Party. (§5 RCOA)

‘state party’ -  means a state which has ratified the UNESCO Convention, acceded to it or accepted it and which is bound by this Convention under international law. (§5 RCOA)

‘unlawful removal’- a cultural object has been unlawfully removed if

            1. it was exported from the territory of a Member State after 31st December 1992

                        a) in breach of its legal provisions on the protection of national cultural objects or

                        b) in breach of Regulation (EC) Nr. 116/2009 on the export of cultural objects, Official Journal L 39 of 10.02.2009, p. 1,

            2. it was exported from the territory of a State Party after 31st December 2015

                        a) without an export certificate pursuant to Article 6 of the UNESCO Convention, or

                        b) after being stolen within the meaning of Article 7 letter b of the UNESCO Convention, or

            3. it was not returned to the Member State or State Party upon the expiry of a period of lawful temporary removal ending after 31st December 1992. (§3 RCOA)

 

Relevant State Agencies

The central authorities pursuant to Article 4 Directive 2014/60/EU are the Federal Monuments Office (in cases concerning cultural objects pursuant to § 2 nr. 1) and the Austrian State Archives (in cases concerning archive materials pursuant to § 25 of the Monument Protection Act – MPA, Federal Gazette Nr. 533/1923, as amended). They must provide assistance to the central authorities of the requesting Member State when identifying unlawfully removed cultural objects. (§6(1) RCOA)

Whether there is a public interest in maintaining an individual monument, a group or a collection, and whether or to what extent it is (also) a unit that must be kept as one entity, must be decided by the Federal Monument Office, after considering the results of scientific research into the matter. (§1(5) MPA)

Immovable monuments (including constitutive parts and appurtenances) as well as movable monuments, which are of great importance to the cultural heritage of every people within the meaning of Article 1 of the UNESCO Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict (Hague Convention), Federal Gazette No. 58/1964, must be designated as such in a list to be produced by the Federal Monuments Authority. The list must also show those objects which, as repositories or locations within the abovementioned Article, also fall under the protection of the Convention. (§13(1) MPA)

To the extent that monuments which are archive materials pursuant to § 25 para. 1 are concerned, the Austrian State Archive takes the place of the Federal Monuments Authority and the Federal Chancellor takes the place of the Federal Minister for Education, Art and Culture. (§24 MPA)