Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art
independent committee advising the United Kingdom government
The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) is a committee of the British government, advising the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) on the export of cultural property. Some of its roles were shifted to the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council in 2005 after the Goodison Report, and Arts Council England now provides the secretariat to the committee. It is currently chaired by Andrew Hochhauser.
If an artwork is sold to a foreign buyer, it also advises the DCMS on whether to delay the granting of an export licence in order to allow time for a British buyer to raise funds to buy the work instead and keep it in the UK, if the committee decides the work is of high enough quality and has a sufficiently significant British connection – this is known as an export bar.
Waverley Criteria
The RCEWA was established in 1952, in accordance with the recommendations of the Waverley Committee, and assesses the objects before it against the three "Waverley Criteria":
Is it closely connected with our history and national life?
Is it of outstanding aesthetic importance?
Is it of outstanding significance for the study of some particular branch of art, learning or history?
The Committee designates an object as a "national treasure" if it considers that its departure
from the UK would be a misfortune on one or more of the above three grounds,
Chair
Lionel Robbins: 1952–1954.
Lord Cottesloe: 1954–1972.
Lord Perth: 1972–1976.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art” is independent committee advising the United Kingdom government. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Reviewing, Committee and Export, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “independent committee advising the United Kingdom government” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7318398. 1 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 3 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2005, 1952, 1954 and 1972.
Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art primary sources, Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art archive and Reviewing research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art”?
- Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
- Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.