Summary
Article 1 of the Cultural Property Export and Import Act broadly defines “cultural property” as property or buildings that have or contain historical artifacts.
In addition to Article 1 this act further clarifies what may consider a “cultural property” in Section 4(2). Section 4(2) is copied below
Statutory Definition
Article 1
Definition of Cultural Property
For the purposes of the present Convention, the term “cultural property” shall cover, irrespective of origin or ownership:
(a) movable or immovable property of great importance to the cultural heritage of every people, such as monuments of architecture, art or history, whether religious or secular; archaeological sites; groups of buildings which, as a whole, are of historical or artistic interest; works of art; manuscripts, books and other objects of artistic, historical or archaeological interest; as well as scientific collections and important collections of books or archives or of reproductions of the property defined above;
(b) buildings whose main and effective purpose is to preserve or exhibit the movable cultural property defined in subparagraph (a) such as museums, large libraries and depositories of archives, and refuges intended to shelter, in the event of armed conflict, the movable cultural property defined in subparagraph (a);
(c) centres containing a large amount of cultural property as defined in subparagraphs (a) and (b), to be known as “centres containing monuments”.
Section 4(2)
Section 4(2) Subject to subsection (3), the Governor in Council may include in the Control List, regardless of their places of origin, any objects or classes of objects hereinafter described in this subsection, the export of which the Governor in Council deems it necessary to control in order to preserve the national heritage in Canada:
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(a) objects of any value that are of archaeological, prehistorical, historical, artistic or scientific interest and that have been recovered from the soil of Canada, the territorial sea of Canada or the inland or other internal waters of Canada;
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(b) objects that were made by, or objects referred to in paragraph (d) that relate to, the aboriginal peoples of Canada and that have a fair market value in Canada of more than five hundred dollars;
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(c) objects of decorative art, hereinafter described in this paragraph, that were made in the territory that is now Canada and are more than one hundred years old:
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(i) glassware, ceramics, textiles, woodenware and works in base metals that have a fair market value in Canada of more than five hundred dollars, and
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(ii) furniture, sculptured works in wood, works in precious metals and other objects of decorative art that have a fair market value in Canada of more than two thousand dollars;
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(d) books, records, documents, photographic positives and negatives, sound recordings, and collections of any of those objects that have a fair market value in Canada of more than five hundred dollars;
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(e) drawings, engravings, original prints and water-colours that have a fair market value in Canada of more than one thousand dollars; and
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(f) any other objects that have a fair market value in Canada of more than three thousand dollars.