Reaction to the Italy/Getty Accord


In a joint press release yesterday the two sides announced the Getty will return 40 objects to Italy. The Cult Statue of a Goddess or Morgantina Aphrodite (pictured here) as its sometimes called will stay at the Getty Villa until 2010. In exchange there will be “broad cultural collaboration that will include loans of significant art works, joint exhibitions, research, and conservation projects.” Of course the sticking point in negotiations had been the Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth, and Italy agreed to postpone negotiations on that object until the outcome of a new criminal investigation. What could a new investigation could hope to uncover 40 years after the statue’s discovery? Not too much I would gather, especially considering a criminal prosecution was unsuccessful as Italy could not establish the statue was discovered in Italian territorial waters.

There are a number of good reactions to the agreement. Two in particular stand out. The art critic for the LA Times, Christopher Knight rightly points out why both sides need to work together. For one, the Getty Villa provides an excellent backdrop for displaying objects from ancient Mediterranean cultures. As he argues:

The Villa is, in fact, the only art museum in the United States devoted solely to the Greek, Etruscan, Roman and other cultures of the ancient Mediterranean. Loans of major objects to the Met and Boston will certainly add sheen to their great historical collections. But antiquities are just one small part of those museums’ attractions.

There is something to be said for the total immersion that a focused museum provides. Italy, where state collections of significant antiquities are anything but scarce, has the wherewithal to provide magnificent loans that will be extraordinarily meaningful in the Villa’s context. Art has richer import and significance in the context of other art.

But also, the Getty has a lot to offer Italy in return:

[T]he museum can make the best use of those loans, given the Getty’s vast resources. Set aside the legal and ethical issues around the disputed Aphrodite for a moment. The work that has been done on the sculpture, in everything from conservation to historical and scientific research, is extraordinary. Dedicating those same resources to potential loans from Italy as well as to the exceptional objects in the Getty’s own collection holds enormous promise.

The recent study of the Morgantina Aphrodite is an excellent example of the kinds of study which could take place. Finally, Knight argues long term loans are a good pragmatic response to the problem of antiquities looting. There is of course a great demand for antiquities, and the legitimate market is unable to meet this demand. As he says “Smart collection sharing can help relieve the pressure.” I think that’s exactly right.

David Gill echoes this sentiment as well. He has a new blog called looting matters. He and his collaborator, Christopher Chippindale, have done some excellent work using concrete data to establish certain classes of antiquities are most likely illicitly excavated. They have done excellent work on cycladic figurines in particular. This along with the work of Ricardo Elia on apulian vases has helped to establish a solid and definite problem with provenance. Gill notes that several items on the list of 40 objects to be returned are from the collection of Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman. He argues many objects in that collection were illicit.

In any event the accord is a welcome development. Source nations and museums should be working together. A combative relationship weakens both sides and distracts from the salient issue: antiquities are an extremely valuable commodity and their trade and disposition must be responsibly regulated.

Correction:

I misspelled Christopher Chippindale’s name and incorrectly attributed Ricardo Elia’s work. I have corrected the second-to-last paragraph accordingly. Many thanks to David Gill for pointing out my errors.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Italy Blinks

Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino report in today’s LA Times that Italy and the Getty have reopened discussions over 46 potentially illicit antiquities. New discussions are possible because it seems Italy has relented in its claim to the “Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth”. As I and others have argued, Italy’s claims to the bronze are weak: the statue was found by chance in the Adriatic, it was probably created in Greece, it has been in the Getty for 30 years, and Italy was unable to establish any wrongdoing during criminal proceedings in the 1960s.

As to a new criminal investigation:

A senior Italian official said the culture ministry decided that the fate of the statue should not be negotiated until a new criminal investigation into the statue’s discovery and export from Italy is complete. The official asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak on the record while negotiations were ongoing.

The new investigation, being conducted by a regional magistrate, was requested several months ago by a local citizens group in Fano, hometown of the fishermen who found the statue, brought it ashore and hid it in a cabbage field before selling it to a local dealer.

But even its citizen sponsors admit the investigation is unlikely to uncover the full story of the artifact’s discovery and export from Italy. Nearly four decades have passed since the bronze athlete left Italy under mysterious circumstances, and many of the people involved have since died.

This is a welcome development, and allows both sides to engage in meaningful negotiations. In the past Italy has given loans of other objects in exchange for the return of contested works. Negotiations will likely be difficult though, as the Getty has 45 contested antiquities, and the criminal trial of Marion True overshadows much of the negotiation. It will be interesting to hear what Francesco Rutelli has to say about this development, as he has argued very strongly for some months that the Bronze must be returned.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Antiquities and Politics


On Wednesday, Christopher Knight of the Los Angeles Times gave an interesting perspective on the Italy/Getty dispute. He expressed some of the same ideas I’ve had for months. Namely, that Italy does not have a strong claim the the “Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth” and Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli, who Lee Rosenbaum has labelled the “Great Repatriator”, is using Italian cultural pride to earn political capital.

To start, Knight could not foresee the recent dispute over a da Vinci loan taking place in the US:

Imagine Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) chaining himself to the gates of New York’s Metropolitan Museum to protest the loan of Emanuel Leutze’s “Washington Crossing the Delaware” to a foreign museum.Unimaginable? That’s the point. The brawl over the Leonardo loan was overwrought, but in Italy it was politics as unusual.

As I said back in March, “Cultural policy is a much more prominent part of Italian politics than in many other countries.” Knight makes an interesting connection from this kind of outrage to recent Italian/American relations:

The flash point was Prodi’s advocacy for the controversial expansion of an American Army base in Vicenza. Thirty thousand peaceful protesters poured into the streets in December, followed by 80,000 in February. Then a motion in the Italian Senate to support the government’s pro-U.S. foreign policy failed, much to Prodi’s surprise. His precarious coalition government temporarily collapsed. It’s still riven with fissures, and the left remains its most unruly faction.

Rutelli’s escalating anti-Getty posturing is old-fashioned political demagoguery, pitched to voters back home. The ultimatum symbolically proclaims that powerful American interests cannot push Italy around, making the government look tough. The emptiness of Italy’s legal and ethical claims for the Getty Bronze are beside the point.

I think that is exactly right. The engine driving Italy’s very effective public repatriation campaign is Italian respect for their own culture. I’ve spoken with some Italians about this very issue, and their immediate response is “of course the bronze should go back”. But in this case such pride may be doing more harm than good. I’ve included a very unscientific poll at the left just to see what readers may think about this dispute. I expect to hear more from both sides in the coming week, as Rutelli’s deadline expires.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Should the Getty send the Bronze to Italy?


We are approaching the deadline imposed by Italian Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli to send the “Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth” to Italy. Rutelli has said the Getty has until the end of July to return 47 antiquities to Italy or risk a “real embargo”. The Getty has announced it will return 26 of those objects, not including the bronze, but the two sides seem unable to broker a deal. In early July Rutelli announced from Fano, the Italian fishing community where the fishermen first brought the bronze ashore, that he had submitted a “final proposal for dialogue and agreement [and if no deal is done,] a real conflict will begin, a real embargo–that is, the interruption of cultural and scientific collaboration between Italy and that museum.”

I’d like to summarize the reasons the Getty has refused to send the bronze to Italy, and why Italy wants the bronze to be included with the other repatriated objects. I’m curious how folks feel about this dispute. I’ve added an unscientific poll at the left where you can cast your vote.

Before I summarize the two arguments, I should make clear that Italy has no legal claim to the statue. They cannot file a suit and ask for the return of the object both because they cannot prove the statue was removed from Italian waters, and the statute of limitations has probably expired anyway. Rather Italy is making an ethical argument for the statue.

How the Statue Was Found:

The Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth” is an almost life-size figure of an athlete wearing a victory wreath. The Statue was created in Greece, possibly by Alexander the Great’s Court Sculptor Lysippos, but it may have been sculpted by another. It was created sometime between the 4th and 2nd Century B.C.

In June, 1964 the Statue was recovered in modern times, by complete accident, off the northern Adriatic coast by fisherman from the Italian city of Fano. They pulled up a heavy object covered in barnacles. The most likely explanation for the find in the Adriatic is that it was taken from Greece in Roman times, and the vessel was lost at sea. A number of Greek objects were taken by invading Roman armies, the most noteworthy instance was during the fall of Syracuse. When the fisherman returned to Fano, they decided to sell the statue. The statue changed hands a number of times.

We know that Giacomo Barbetti purchased the statue from the fisherman. For a time, Barbetti and his two brothers stored the statue at the home of Father Giovanni Nagni. Barbetti then sold the statue to another man for 4,000,000 lire, not a great sum of money. It would have amounted to about $4,000. In 1966, the 3 Barbettis and Father Nagni were charged with purchasing and concealing stolen property under Italy’s 1939 Antiquities Law. The prosecution reached the Court of Appeals of Rome, however it overturned the convictions for 2 reasons (1) The prosecutors did not establish the statue came from Italian waters, and (2) there was insufficient evidence demonstrating that the statue was of “artistic and archaeological interest”. After the Barbetti’s sold the statue, the Provenance (chain of title) of the statue is a bit vague, and open to some speculation. Most likely it went through a series of owners, in an attempt to achieve a bona fide purchase at some point. It went from a Brazilian Monastery to England, and later to Munich.

In 1977, the Getty Trust purchased the Bronze for $3.95 million. It has been publicly displayed since 1978. Until 2006, Italy made no more formal requests for the Bronze, though they did ask the Getty to evaluate the possibility of returning the statue to Italy in 1989.

Italy’s Claim

Italy’s claim relies on the creation of some kind of nexus between Italy’s cultural heritage and the Bronze based on the time it was brought ashore by the fishermen at Fano. Italian authorities have at various times labelled the bronze as stolen, despite the fact Italy is unable to establish the statue was found in it’s own national waters, and as a result its national patrimony law will not apply. However, Italy does ban the export of antiquities, and the statue was almost certainly illicitly removed from Italy before traveling to Switzerland and Frankfurt before its sale to the Getty.

The Getty’s Response

The Getty has said that Italy had no claim to the bronze once it left Italy. In fact, Italian law would shield a good-faith purchaser in this case. Italy was unable to establish the statue was found in Italian waters during the criminal prosecutions in the 1960’s. Also, the Getty has argued the statue has been at the Getty far longer then it ever stayed on Italian soil.

We don’t know if the Getty knew about the statue’s illicit export when they bought it, or if they tried to research its provenance before the purchase. I’ve stated who I think has the stronger claim in the past, but I’m interested in what others may think based on the arguments put forward by both sides.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

More Posturing from Francesco Rutelli


Italy’s Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli just returned from a visit to the United States, and no visit is complete without more criticism of the Getty. Yesterday Rutelli repeated his claims. The LA Times has a good compilation of the Wire reports here. There is little new information save a new deadline. Rutelli says the Getty has until the end of July to return contested objects, else risk a “real embargo” which would preclude loans and collaborations with Italy in research and conservation projects. Rutelli said he had submitted a “final proposal for dialogue and agreement [and if no deal is done,] a real conflict will begin, a real embargo–that is, the interruption of cultural and scientific collaboration between Italy and that museum.”

What exactly the “final proposal” entails is unknown. Ron Hartwig the Getty spokesman did say that Rutelli sent a “very cordial…very encouraging” letter and that Michael Brand had “responded in kind”. As I understand it, the Getty has agreed to return many of the contested objects which Italy wants. However, the Getty is unable to reach an agreement because Rutelli has insisted no deal can be finished without the return of this statue, the “Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth”. I’ve discussed this particular claim before, which you can read about by clicking the label below. Italy has no legal claim to the bronze statue, and a weak ethical argument for its return as well.

Rutelli is trying to associate the stronger claim the Getty has in the Bronze statue with the other objects with far more dubious provenances. It gets Rutelli’s comments in the papers, and it keeps the repatriation issue open, but seems unlikely to lead to a workable compromise.

UPDATE:

Rutelli made yesterday’s announcement from the fishing port of Fano in Italy, where the statue was brought ashore by the fishermen who found it. I have updated the first paragraph accordingly.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

The "Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth"

Earlier this week I had the great pleasure to give a presentation to the University of Aberdeen Legal research Society. I discussed the very public dispute between Italy and the Getty museum regarding the “Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth”. The discussion which ensued was furthered greatly by the presence of Neil Curtis, Senior Curator of the Marischal Museum, as well as a couple of Italian colleagues. We had a very interesting discussion, and much of the credit for that goes to them. I would like to outline here my general comments on the dispute. I have posted on many of these ideas before, but if nothing else the dispute over the Bronze allows a timely and interesting introduction to cultural policy and repatriation.

As the LA Times put it last fall, “To whom does a statue made in ancient Greece, stolen by Romans and found in the Adriatic by Italian fishermen 2,000 years later, rightfully belong?”

First, what is the Getty trust, and why has it gotten itself into trouble in recent decades? J. Paul Getty was an American Industrialist, and the founder of the Getty Oil company. He started the Getty Trust in 1953. Today, the Trust may be the richest art institution in the world, boasting assets of close to $9 billion dollars. In recent decades, the Getty pursued a very aggressive antiquities-buying campaign, which by itself may be an innocent activity. However we now know that many of those antiquities were illicitly excavated or exported illegally.

Italy has a large amount of discovered and undiscovered antiquities. It is also an industrialized nation. Many of the nations which are considered source nations (i.e. those that export more cultural objects than they import) are underdeveloped. So Italy is in a unique position. Historically, Italian antiquities have been exported to the rest of Europe, and other parts of the world. Increasingly, Italy has sought to prevent the loss of these cultural objects. The last 18 months has seen the Italian Culture Ministry lead a very aggressive repatriation campaign with three components

1. Criminal Investigations and Prosecutions,

2. Raised repatriation claims with Museums and Private collectors,

3. A Public Relations Campaign.


There have been a number of high-profile repatriations by American museums in recent months. The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and the Metropolitan Museum (Euphronios Krater) in New York have both agreed to return antiquities.

A former curator at the Getty, Marion True is on trial in Rome for conspiring to deal in Italian antiquities. This has had a very unpleasant public relations consequences for the Getty. Italy has demanded the return of 52 Antiquities from the Getty. The two parties have been negotiating a return of many of the objects for many months. However this fall, Italy abruptly broke of talks with the Getty, and said no agreement could be reached unless the Getty returned the Bronze. If the Getty did not agree to these terms, the Italians threatened the Getty with a “cultural embargo”.

Francesco Rutelli, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Culture and Heritage sent an Op-Ed to the Wall Street Journal saying:

Italy has been trying for over six months to conclude an agreement with Los Angeles’s Getty Museum on 46 ancient works of art that were illicitly removed from our country. I still hope to succeed. But on one point, I am unable to understand the museum’s position. How can they think that the Italian government will accept an agreement that contemplates renouncing possession of those works of art?

The 46 works that we are waiting for include the Venus illicitly removed from Morgantina in Sicily , and the bronze Athlete that was hauled up in a fishing net from the waters of the Adriatic sea and later secretly smuggled out of Italy in total violation of its laws.

What then of the statue itself? To better evaluate Italy’s claims, we need to look at the circumstances under which it was found. The Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth” is an almost life-size figure of an athlete wearing a victory wreath. The Statue was created in Greece, possibly by Alexander the Great’s Court Sculptor Lysippos, but it may have been sculpted by another. It was created sometime between the 4th and 2nd Century B.C. Now my Italian colleagues rightly pointed out that a number of Greek settlements were founded in what we today think of as Italy.

In June, 1964 the Statue was recovered in modern times, by complete accident, off the northern Adriatic coast by fisherman from the Italian city of Fano. They pulled up a heavy object covered in barnacles. The most likely explanation for the find in the Adriatic is that it was taken from Greece in Roman times, and the vessel was lost at sea. A number of Greek objects were taken by invading Roman armies, the most noteworthy instance was during the fall of Syracuse. When the fisherman returned to Fano, they decided to sell the statue. The statue changed hands a number of times.

We know that Giacomo Barbetti purchased the statue from the fisherman. For a time, Barbetti and his two brothers stored the statue at the home of Father Giovanni Nagni. Barbetti then sold the statue to another man for 4,000,000 lire, not a great sum of money. It would have amounted to about $4,000. In 1966, the 3 Barbettis and Father Nagni were charged with purchasing and concealing stolen property under Italy’s 1939 Antiquities Law. The prosecution reached the Court of Appeals of Rome, however it overturned the convictions for 2 reasons (1) The prosecutors did not establish the statue came from Italian waters, and (2) there was insufficient evidence demonstrating that the statue was of “artistic and archaeological interest”. After the Barbetti’s sold the statue, the Provenance (chain of title) of the statue is a bit vague, and open to some speculation. Most likely it went through a series of owners, in an attempt to achieve a bona fide purchase at some point. It went from a Brazilian Monastery to England, and later to Munich.

In 1977, the Getty Trust purchased the Bronze for $3.95 million. It has been publicly displayed since 1978. Until 2006, Italy made no more formal requests for the Bronze, though they did ask the Getty to evaluate the possibility of returning the statue to Italy in 1989.

Legal Analysis of the Dispute

Even if the statue was found in Italian national waters, it’s nearly impossible to prove at this point. The criminal trials of the 3 Barbetti’s and Father Nagni loom large here. Italian prosecutors were not able to establish in 1968 that the Bronze was discovered in Italian territorial waters. To attempt to prove it nearly 40 years on is nearly impossible.

If the statue had been found in Italian national waters, both US and Italian law would dictate that Italy owns the Bronze. The 1939 Italian Patrimony law requires that the object was declared within the territory of Italy to apply. To be sure, if Italy was able establish the statue had been discovered in Italian national waters they would have brought a legal action long ago in US federal court, or even had Federal prosecutors seize the statue.

Illegal Export from Italy Does Not Dictate It should be handed over to Italy

Logically, the Bronze came ashore in Italy after it was discovered. Italian law requires that antiquities deemed of interest by the State, even those owned by private individuals cannot be exported without a license. US law does not enforce foreign export regulations. This goes back to the general rule that Public laws of another nation will not be enforced. US v. Schultz, 333 F.3d 393 (2d Cir. 2003), US v. McClain,545 F.2d 988 (5th Cir. 1977). Also, there are a lot of different kinds of export restrictions, and they are not always working well in limiting illicit trade. The reasons for this are beyond our present concern, but it is well settled that most nations will not enforce the export restrictions of another nation.

International Law

Italy has argued that international treaties dictate the Bronze should be returned. What they are referencing is the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property.

This does impose on states an obligation to prevent the illicit export of cultural property. However, it contains no provisions mandating the return or permitting the seizure of objects, except those that have been stolen.

The Convention is by its own terms, not in force unless enacted into domestic law. However, when the statue was imported into the US, neither Italy nor the US had ratified the Convention.

Ethical Analysis of the Dispute

Finally, what are the values we should look at in evaluating cultural property controversies?

  1. Archaeological Context

  2. Preservation of the Object

  3. Access by the Public

  4. International Movement

  5. Preserving a National Patrimony of Works

Italy’s position relies on the creation of some kind of nexus between Italy’s cultural heritage and the Bronze based on the time it was brought ashore by the fishermen at Fano. This is a very difficult argument for the Italians to win in my view. What’s more, the Italian authorities are ignoring the economic value of the Bronze: Maurizio Fiorilli: Italy’s Chief Antiquities Prosecutor has said The economic value is of little consequence. What is important is the gain Getty will derive on the ethical plane. Moral gain is the reward. Also, the monetary value of the objects is not Italy’s problem. It is the problem of those who spend good money for objects that are without clear title and are illicitly removed from their place of cultural origin. It is up to the authorities in the USA who are responsible for controlling the Getty to investigate how the money was spent. Culture predisposes honesty and transparency.”

Part of the problem here is the two different ways Italy and the Getty seem to be evaluating the claim. Italy is asserting an ethical claim to the statue based on its ties to Greek culture. However, the US has a very strong sense of Greek and Roman culture as well. After all, the Supreme Court is a copy of classical architecture.

None of the 5 core values come down on Italy’s side in my view. Destruction of archaeological context is a huge problem, and one of the worst aspects of the illicit trade. However, this was a chance find, the fishermen weren’t doing anything wrong. Other objects in the Getty’s collection should certainly be returned, and the Getty has in fact agreed to return 26 objects of the contested objects. The question becomes, why is Italy insisting on the Bronze? Why are they preventing a good faith compromise here by insisting on a tenuous claim to the bronze?

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com