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Art & Art History vocabulary · Collecting & the Art Market

Provenance

Meaning in art & art history, with examples

/ˈprɑːvənəns/nounCommon term

In art & art history, provenance means: The documented history of who has owned an artwork since it was made, used to show that it is genuine and was acquired legally.

In Turkish: provenans, sahiplik geçmişi, köken

How it is used

Important for auctions, museums and the law. A work has good, clear or incomplete provenance. Gaps in provenance, especially for antiquities or for the years 1933–1945, raise questions about theft or looting. Auction catalogues list the provenance of each lot.

Example sentences

  1. The museum refused to buy the vase because its provenance before 1990 was unknown.

  2. The catalogue lists the painting's full provenance, from the artist's studio to the present owner.

Common collocations

  • provenance research
  • impeccable provenance
  • gap in the provenance
  • provenance records
  • collectorA person or institution that buys and keeps artworks or other objects, often over many years and around a particular theme.
  • auctionA public sale in which artworks or other objects are sold to the person who offers the most money.
  • attributeTo say that a work was made by a particular artist, place or period, based on evidence such as style, documents or scientific tests.
  • forgeryA work made to look like the genuine work of another artist or period in order to deceive buyers; also the crime of making such works.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Collecting & the Art Market

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