Money laundering using works of art, archaeological artifacts, and other cultural assets remains a little-known and under-reported practice in Latin America. But a recent report sheds light on how these schemes operate.
Purchasing valuable cultural assets with illicit proceeds offers criminals a way to store their ill-gotten gains and obscure their origins. In recent years, major art collections have been tied to corrupt politicians and members of criminal groups across the region.
As of 2023, Colombia’s government agency tasked with managing assets seized by the state held an inventory of more than 1,000 artworks, including two attributed to 17th-century Flemish master Peter Paul Rubens. In Guatemala, authorities confiscated over 120 artworks in 2021 from Erick Archila, a former energy and mines minister under President Otto Pérez Molina, who faces charges of illicit association and money laundering. In Brazil, authorities seized more than 200 pieces—some by Spanish artists Joan Miró and Salvador Dalí—that were allegedly used to launder funds linked to the Lava Jato corruption scandal, one of the largest in the country’s history.
