The famous art owned by bailed-out banks.

Last week, the Royal Bank of Scotland agreed to display its corporate art collection to the public, following pressure by Parliament and the art world. RBS has long kept the 2,200 pieces under wraps, although the bank has been 70 percent owned by British taxpayers since November 2008. In fact, 300 works are in storage, according to the Guardian, and only this one, of Irish statesman Daniel O’Connell, has been on public view in recent years. We wondered: Shouldn’t bailed-out U.S. banks do the same? And what, exactly, would they show?

This Van Gogh is valued at $6 million and once hung in CEO Hank Greenberg’s office, but it has been at the center of a legal battle over its ownership since his 2005 ouster. Greenberg claims that the painting is owned by Starr International, a vehicle he set up to fund bonuses for AIG (AIG) executives, which has since turned into a charitable organization. AIG believes it still has a stake in the firm—and the painting. The U.S. government, meanwhile, has an $80 billion stake in AIG.

“We do not collect for investment,” Suzanne Lemakis, head curator for Citigroup (C), has said. Works in corporate collections are often acquired for modest prices. And with little motivation to sell, companies often end up sitting on masterpieces after artists have died or their reputations have grown—making valuations even tougher. For example, Warhol prints are ubiquitous, but his auction record for a painting is $71 million. Citigroup has received $36.5 billion in TARP funds, though the bank is still struggling to regain its footing.

When Bear Stearns opened its Madison Avenue headquarters in 2003, it commissioned and bought a slew of artworks, building a collection of more than 1,500 pieces. The most impressive works, by artists like Josef Albers and Ed Ruscha, were placed in the conference and dining room suite. For the weekend of the firm’s demise, this venue became a holding pen for bidders, including the eventual owner, government-backed JPMorgan Chase (JPM). No word on what JPMorgan plans to do with the works.

Goldman Sachs-VP-turned-author Lisa Endlich writes that Goldman’s (GS) art collection is “unusual," including “enormous weathervanes, daguerreotypes … and a wide variety of patchwork quilts.”  Another book notes that pieces by Andy Warhol, Frank Stella, and Mel Bochner dot the halls. A former art consultant spoke about a work by Jenny Holzer, placed near the cafeteria, that read “buckets of blood/corporate greed,” and was taken down (but not sold) after two weeks.

Bailout bucks may be keeping some art sealed up in the boardroom, but the alternative, as seen in the bankruptcy of Lehman Bros., isn’t much prettier. Many of the firm’s 3,500 works have been placed into auction, at what some say are fire-sale prices. Barclays, which bought some of Lehman, and Neuberger Berman, which was spun off as part of the bankruptcy, have been left to decide if they want to claim any works. Former Lehman CEO Dick Fuld is an avid collector, but it’s hard to call this development the cruelest cut.