 |
| Source: J. Paul Getty Museum |
The J. Paul Getty Museum has decided to return bronze kline to Türkiye [press release]. This was acquired from Nikolas Koutoulakis in 1982.
The kline and other objects seemingly derived from Türkiye have been discussed elsewhere (Gill 2019).
It is even suggested that the bed or kline ‘probably entered the antiquities market as the result of illicit excavations’ (Baughan and Özgen 2012, 63). It may even coincide with a bronze bed that was reported to have been looted in 1979. Interestingly it was claimed that the bed had passed through the S. Schweitzer collection; such a collection was claimed for one of the pieces that the Getty has returned to Italy and it was noted that this may have been ‘a convenient way to launder recently surfaced antiquities’ (Gill and Chippindale 2007a, 216, 229, no. 23). A further report even suggested that the bed had been acquired by a Paris dealer in 1936, though there seems to be no authenticated documentation.
Why has it taken the Getty so long to resolve this dispute? What other objects in the collection will follow the kline back to Türkiye?
References
Baughan, E. P., and I. Özgen. 2012. "A bronze kline from Lydia." AK 55: 63–87.
Gill, D. W. J. 2019. "Context matters: Nicolas Koutoulakis, the antiquities market and due diligence." Journal of Art Crime 22: 71–78.
Gill, D. W. J., and C. Chippindale. 2007. "From Malibu to Rome: further developments on the return of antiquities." International Journal of Cultural Property 14: 205-40.
No comments:
Post a Comment