Managing director and co-founder of the Le Freeport in Luxembourg David Arendt has announced that he will be leaving at the end of the year. The company described his departure as “amicable.”
The Luxembourg Freeport, a high-end facility for the storage of fine art and other valuables, became operational in 2014 under the leadership of Yves Bouvier, president of the shipping and storage company Natural Le Coultre.
The Freeport has come under scrutiny in the past two years for a number of legal investigations. In 2015, Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev accused Bouvier of having defrauded him in the sale of a Modigliani painting, and filed legal actions against him. The case is being tried in Singapore, where Bouvier resides.
A few months later, Picasso’s stepdaughter Catherine Hutin-Blay accused a Freeport associate, the French art dealer Olivier Thomas, of having stolen dozens of Picassos from her. The investigation is still ongoing.
Speaking to the local paper Tageblatt, Arendt described his four years at Le Freeport as “good,” but said he was ready for a new start, not revealing any further details other that he will be staying in Luxembourg.
In 2017, Le Freeport plans to open a facility in Shanghai.