Tag: Italy

Protection, Preservation and Commodification

Italy has been making tremendous strides of late in securing the return of objects. A major tenet underlying these successful repatriation claims has been the idea that by cutting off buyers of illicitly excavated objects, and by ensuring objects are not entering major museum collections, the demand for the illicit trade will be substantially reduced.

This is an important policy shift, and has unquestionably altered the cultural property policy landscape. However I think its worth asking if nations like Italy are following through with their aspirations, and if everything is being done to preserve sites and archaeological context. It stands to reason that more nations of origin will be adopting this Italian strategy, but we should ask ourselves if perhaps these efforts are looking at only one part of the problem.

In fact as I tried to point out last week, it looks like more nations of origin will be banding together and attempting perhaps to negotiate as a bloc, in much the same way that OPEC has dominated the world’s supply of oil. TIME Magazine’s Richard Lacayo in his “Looking Around” blog responded to my assertion by rightly pointing out that “OPEC is powerful because it sits on top of a natural resource that, at the end of the day, the world requires. Antiquities source nations have…..antiquities.”

He’s right of course that there isn’t nearly the same demand for antiquities as for a commodity like oil, but nations of origin do need market states in a number of ways which aren’t often fully appreciated. Italy, though it was very forceful in its recent negotiations with the Getty, the Met, and the MFA Boston chose not to use all of the legal ammunition it perhaps could have, and even reached very generous reciprocal loan agreements in exchange for the repatriated objects. The obvious question is: why be so accommodating if there were such powerful ethical principles and photographic evidence which called for the return of these objects?

The answer I think is that these nations need good relationships with other nations, and one of the major reasons is the enormous tourist dollars visitors from America (and elsewhere) can bring to these nations. Capitalizing on this tourism can have a heavy price however.
Adam L. Freeman has an excellent article on Bloomberg in which he details the struggle Italian authorities have had in properly caring for Pompeii (pictured above), “Chunks of frescoes depicting life in the Roman city are missing, carried away by visitors or eroded by the elements. Graffiti is gouged into walls. Tourists ignore signs forbidding flash photography as they take pictures of erotic designs inside the Lupanare, an ancient brothel.” This all comes as Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi attempts to cut expenditures, with the Culture Ministry likely to receive heavy cuts after the former government cut protection by 20 percent this year already. In fact, Italy has declared a state of emeregency for the ancient city and appointed Renato Profili former head policeman for Naples to oversee the situation.
Profili is quoted “It’s obvious that there is an emergency in a country like Italy where there’s so much to protect and so little money to do it.” This despite the 33 million euros generated by all the tourists who visit the city.

Other nations are having similar struggles. Robert Turnbull a few weeks ago in the New York Times details a museum/retail mall development in Cambodia near Angkor Wat, pictured here.

There aren’t easy answers of course, but merely returning objects to nations of origins won’t by itself protect sites, heritage and context.

The valuable tourist dollars which these sites bring in can help alleviate the situation, but it also carries with it the distasteful tradeoffs, such as the commodification of heritage, and the wear-and-tear which millions of visitors will always cause. Hopefully nations of origin will be able to move beyond the dramatic repatriations, which are a necessary step, and continue to work to preserve the sites themselves.

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

An OPEC for Nations of Origin? (LATE UPDATE)

OPEC is the organization of oil-producing countries which regulates their production, price, etc. A number of people have suggested that perhaps a similar movement should be adopted among nations of origin for antiquities loans, repatriations, and perhaps even licit sales. It would seem to be a terrific strategy for these nations to combine their efforts, so long as they can agree upon similar strategies. A few items in the news and among other blogs point to the emergence of such a collaboration.
First, Italy and Greece have continued their cooperation. The Greek Minister of Culture, Mihalis Liapis and Sandro Bondi, the Italian Minister for Culture have signed a memorandum of cooperation on cultural issues. As part of the agreement, the Nostoi exhibition will travel to the New Acropolis Museum in Athens in September, and there will likely be more pressure on institutions and private collectors to return objects, as David Gill recently noted with the news that Shelby White will return objects to Greece.

This news comes as Egypt continued its recent efforts and signed yet another agreement, this time with Ecuador. Egypt has already signed agreements with Italy, Cyprus, Denmark, Cuba, Kazakhstan, Jordan, Peru and Switzerland according to the Egyptian weekly Al-Ahram.

I think we can take a couple of lessons from these efforts. First, it is another indication that UNESCO has had a difficult time building consensus, and the spread of these bilateral agreements is a sign the UNESCO Convention itself does very little if a signatory does not want to give much teeth to its accession.

Second, these repatriations and cooperation may be a very good thing, however the real test of these efforts remains how well sites are protected, and whether there remains a workable heritage management policy in these nations. Recent news out of Greece suggests they are not. It seems last month the Greek parliament has taken a step last month to allow divers to access the entirety of the Greek coastline. This would be very good for tourism, but how are the objects these divers find going to be managed or educated? How will sites be affected?


Pictured here of course is the Bronze Statue of a Victorious Youth, a statue found by chance in the Adriatic in the 1960s. How many more of these objects will be uncovered if the Greek coast is opened up to divers? I know very little about how the Greek waters are currently protected, but it would seem to me to be a poor policy which only criticizes foreign institutions and buyers while not properly protecting domestic objects and sites before they are exported.

LATE UPDATE:

David Gill has kindly noted in the comments, and on his blog that the report I noted above is out-of-date and most likely inaccurate. It seems Greece is not, of course, thinking about opening its coast to amateur underwater salvors. However, I think the underlying question I raised is still valid in Greece and elsewhere: what can and should be done about underwater sites and wrecks

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

Italy-Cleveland Museum of Art Agreement?

On Friday, the AP reported that Italy and the Cleveland Museum of Art had reached an oral agreement to return some antiquities to Italy. Lee Rosenbaum rightly points out that this may be an example of Italy (specifically its departing minister Francesco Rutelli) jumping the gun before an agreement has in fact been concluded.

Though Rutelli has certainly achieved a number of notable successes during his term as Italy’s Culture Minister, his actions have also seemingly been motivated in many cases by the desire to gain political and media attention. This present announcement seems to be a case of Rutelli attempting to take credit for one last repatriation as he is soon to be replaced by Sandro Bondi in Berlusconi’s new Italian government. Though an agreement may have been reached in principle with the Cleveland Museum of Art, nothing is set in stone nor reduced to writing, and negotiations appear to be ongoing. The principal issue in these cases often isn’t necessarily what will go back to Italy, but what kinds of loans and agreements Cleveland can hope to receive in return.

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

Antiquities Recovered in Rome


Italian authorities announced on Friday they had recovered over a dozen antiquities hidden in a boat garage near Fiumicino, which is very near Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci airport. The AP report indicated:

The most spectacular find was a marble head of Lucius Verus, a portrait of the emperor who co-ruled Rome from 161 until his death in 169 alongside his adoptive brother, Marcus Aurelius.

The bearded visage of the emperor is believed to have been secretly dug out at a site in the Naples area and was probably destined for the international market, said Capt. Massimo Rossi, of a special police unit that hunts down archaeological thieves.

No arrests have been made, but 13 people are being investigated for allegedly trafficking in antiquities, Rossi said.

The announcement also indicated another recovery:

In a separate operation, Italy recovered a marble head depicting Faustina, the wife of the Emperor Antoninus Pius, the predecessor and adoptive father of Lucius Verus and Marcus Aurelius, police said in a statement.

Faustina’s portrait had been stolen in 1961 from an ancient theater in Minturno, south of Rome, and made its way to an American collector. The statue was returned by the collector through U.S. authorities after he realized it had been looted, Rossi said.

This strikes me as the more interesting announcement. It strikes me as odd, and is more indication of the means Italy has used to recover objects. They really have capitalized on this tide of repatriation from North America, and have secured a number of secondary returns, without having to resort to costly international litigation. The legal claims for this portrait, apparently illegally excavated in 1961, would have probably been expensive and time-consuming, and likely quit difficult. It is interesting the success Italy has had by eschewing litigation, and pointing out (rightly so) of the damage done to contextual information.

It seems a bit odd though that we do not learn of the collector, how she acquired the object, or who the dealer was who sold it. At a certain point, it may be worth asking the Italian authorities where all these recovered objects are going to be studied or displayed, and if these “repatriation exhibitions” will serve to decrease illegal excavation and export, or merely serve to display some drugs on the table. Perhaps this display does give heart to the authorities and heritage advocates, however these gains also provide other political benefits; and may provide an distorted image of the effectiveness of Italian and international efforts. After all, even well-known sites are being damaged in the heart of Rome.

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

Stripping Trajan’s Forum

Trajan’s forum was built by the order of its namesake after the conquest (and the pillaging which ensued) of Dacia, which ruled parts of present day Romania and Moldova. The forum opened in 112 AD, and Trajan’s column was inaugurated a year later. Parts of the market and Trajan’s column remain.

However yesterday archaeologists in Rome said the Forum had been stripped of all the statue fragments and amphorae shards. An Italian reporter also carried away boxes of ancient artifacts without being challenged. Malcolm Moore has more in today’s Telegraph:

An archaeologist working at the site, who asked not to be named, said: “Everything has been taken from Trajan’s Forum. The close-circuit television cameras are pointless, and the gates are practically non-existent. Even a child could climb over them.

“The treasures of ancient Rome are very vulnerable, but there are lots of gaps in the security system of one of the most important archaeological areas in the world.” He added that he had often seen people in restricted areas, collecting keepsakes.

The newspaper blamed the 20 million tourists who pass through the city each year for the looting. “Who knows how many of these small fragments now adorn living rooms all over the world?” it said…

“This is an open-air museum,” said Eugenio La Rocca, the head of Rome’s cultural heritage authority.

“You have to bear in mind that we cannot cover every angle, especially since restoration work is going on. We cannot put bunkers of guards everywhere. If we did the whole of Rome would be a giant bunker.

“However, the area is closed off and the television monitoring system is connected to a cabin staffed by guards. It is also connected to the police.”

Recently the Italian authorities announced the recovery of 1.000 objects from Trajan’s Villa which had been stolen in 2002. Even policing known sites, in the middle of a city is difficult. The protest really points out the difficulty in this kind of heritage tourism. It brings tremendous economic benefits, but does have negative consequence, including disturbing sensitive areas, and also this kind of petty looting and taking. I’m not sure if the answer to this problem is more security, though that would certainly help. Perhaps what is needed is more public education about why this kind of taking is destructive, and damages these ancient monuments.

I wonder if perhaps these protests are too quick to blame foreign tourists. It seems possible Italians may want a piece of the forum as well.

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

UK Enforces Italy’s Export Restrictions


European Council Directive 93/7/EEC creates a regime for the return of cultural property within the Community for cultural objects belonging to the national artistic, historical, or archaeological heritage which has been illegally exported from a member state.

Martin Bailey of the Art Newspaper has an example of this in practice. Two works by Francesco Guardi have been seized by Scotland yard in London. The paintings, The Departure of the Bucintoro to San Nicolo on the Lido and The Return of the Bucintoro to the Palaxxo Ducale (picture here) were owned by Lord Shuttleworth, and were later bought by an Italian, Mario Crespi in 1952. The paintings were purchased three years ago by an Italian art dealer, but it appears an export licence was made in Milan but the works were perhaps intentionally misattributed to an “anonymous artist” thereby allowing for their export. When a UK art dealer sought to re-export the works from the UK, he correctly labeled the works. The works may be worth “€6m ($9.4m) in Italy, but over £10m ($20m)” elsewhere.

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

Italian Police Seize 1,000 Artifacts… last year

The AP is reporting that Italian police have announced the raid of a wealthy Roman’s country home and the seizure 1,000 artifacts. It seems the objects had been stolen years ago in 2002 from one of Emperor Trajan’s villas. The suspect is not in custody, “The prosecutors declined to identify the suspect since authorities were still probing the theft, but said he was an affluent engineer who used the stolen artifacts to decorate his country home, inserting pieces of ancient Roman mosaics in his basement floor and decorating his fireplace and bathroom with other pieces.”

This is a depressing announcement for a number of reasons. First, why did it take so long for the announcement. Second, the thefts appear have been taken from a known site, which is only partially excavated. By all accounts this is an extremely important archaeological site. What kind of site security was in place in 2002? If the known sites cannot even be protected, how can unknown tombs and undiscovered sites be adequately policed. This highlights that though the antiquities trade is international, not every buyer of looted Italian antiquities comes from outside Italy, and in fact the looters are most often Italian. Finally, will there be no criminal charges filed? The wheels of the Italian justice system seem particularly slow.

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

Tokyo Loves da Vinci

Nearly a year ago, I wrote about the protests surrounding the loan of Leonardo da Vinci’s the Annunciation to the Tokyo National Museum for three months. The loan generated massive protests in Italy. Italian Senator Peolo Amato even chained himself to the entrance to the Uffizi gallery in Florence.

The loan went forward, and in this week’s annual gallery attendance rundown in the Art Newspaper, the work attracted over 10,000 visitors per day, the highest daily average for any exhibition since the Art Newspaper began compiling such statistics in 1997. The full table is here.

The attendance is impressive, and it’s worth noting that though there may be small risks associated with transporting a work like this, perhaps the trade-off is worth it to earn revenue, but more importantly perhaps, to allow Japanese to experience an important Italian work of art.

There are indications though that the work is not entirely a work of da Vinci, but he may have finished a work by Domenico Ghirlandaio, a fellow apprentice in the same workshop as Leonardo. As such, in 1869, soon after the work came to the Uffizi from a monastery in Monteoliveto, it was recognized as perhaps an early work by da Vinci, who probably inserted the angel on the left of the work. A detail of the angel is pictured above.

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

Repatriation and Universal Museums

Drake Bennett has a good article in yesterday’s Boston Globe titled Finders, keepers. It’s a lengthy overview of the back and forth between museums and nations of origin regarding looted artifacts, and other objects taken during colonial times. It’s worth a read, as it features comments from James Cuno, the director of the Art Institute of Chicago, Ricardo Elia from the archeology department at Boston University, and others.

Cuno gets featured prominently, perhaps because of his strong arguments that many objects should remain in museums in market nations. He also extends the argument of the late Paul Bator, who in his seminal “An Essay on the International Trade in Art” 34 Stanford Law Review 275 (1982), argued that many restrictions on antiquities, including strong export restrictions serve to increase the black market.

Bennett’s piece is a good overview, and a good introduction to some of the core debates in the antiquities trade. By necessity he paints many of these restitution claims with too broad a brush though. He writes

Along with Italy, the governments of Greece, Guatemala, El Salvador, Peru, Turkey, China, and Cambodia, among others, have pushed to reclaim prized artifacts from collections around the world. They have tightened their laws governing the export of antiquities or intensified the enforcement of existing laws and international agreements; they have made impassioned public cases on the world stage.

I don’t think these nations of origin have in fact increased their domestic legal schemes; in nearly every case he mentions here these nations have had very strong legal regimes for many decades, some dating to the very beginning of the 20th century. Italy for example has a national patrimony law dating to 1939. In some cases they are working more closely with the US State Department under the Cultural Property Implementation Act. However, the main difference is the prominent Italian claims of late, which were the result of one fantastically successful criminal investigation which implicated an Italian dealer named Giacomo Medici, and by association his buyers Robert Hecht, Marion True, the Getty, MFA Boston, and the Met.

This allowed for the return of these implicated objects; of course the claims for return were bolstered by photographic evidence of many of the Nostoi objects, which clearly indicated they were illegally excavated on a massive scale. This is a far different argument than the one for say the return of the Parthenon Marbles, or other objects acquired during colonial times, or for the return of other objects which may have been acquired legitimately. I think we need to be particularly careful not to lump too many of these restitution arguments together, and indeed to be honest about how and why objects are returned. The salient issues remain: how are nations of origin protecting sites domestically, how do market nations respond to illegal activity, how are museums acquiring new objects, and is the market conducting the needed provenance checks? That is the only way to prevent future illegal activity.

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