Sicily: Culture and Conquest

© David Gill

The British Museum is currently showing a temporary exhibition, 'Sicily: Culture and Conquest'.

The accompanying catalogue by Dirk Booms and Peter Higgs (British Museum Press, 2016) does contain illustration and discussion of some material returned to Sicily. The pieces include:

• The Morgantina Treasure, returned from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art (p. 24, fig. 7; p. 124, fig. 91). This had been acquired through Robert Hecht (and prior 'history'). 'The hoard was found by illicit treasure hunters in the 1970s in two pits beneath the floor of a house' (p. 124).
• The pair of Acrolithic statues, returned from the University of Virginia Art Museum at Charlottesville where they had been on loan from the Maurice Tempelsman collection (p. p. 68, fig. 49). They had previously been handled by Robin Symes. 'Thought to have been illicitly dug up in Building A in the sanctuary at San Francesco Bisconiti (sic.), the statues are likely to represent Demeter and Persephone' (p. 68).
• The 'Aphrodite' from Morgantina, returned from the J. Paul Getty Museum (p. 69, fig. 50)
• The Hades, returned from the J. Paul Getty Museum (p. 70, fig. 51). This had been acquired through Robin Symes and had formed part of the Tempelsman collection. 'reputedly discovered in the sanctuary at San Francesco Bisconti' (p. 71).

Morgantina Treasure. Source: MMA

Hades. Source: J. Paul Getty Museum

Acrolithic heads. Source: BBC

It is surprising that there is no mention of Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino's Chasing Aphrodite, or Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini's The Medici Conspiracy (or journal literature) that address some of the concerns relating to this Sicilian material. There does not appear to be reference to Dietrich von Bothmer's full publication of the silver hoard.

Looting Matters: Returning Sicilian Antiquities

Looting Matters: Returning Sicilian Antiquities
SWANSEA, Wales, March 26 /PRNewswire/

A discussion of the Morgantina antiquities returned to Italy.

Morgantina Antiquities Set for Return and Display

The agreement between North American museums and Italy have included three lots of material associated with Morgantina:

• The Morgantina silver hoard (from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art)
• The acrolithic Aphrodite (from the J. Paul Getty Museum)
• The acrolithic sculptures (formerly on loan to the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville)
  

The names of Robin Symes and Robert Hecht have been linked with parts of this batch. 

Together this group of objects represents some $22 million worth of acquisitions.


The Italian press is now reporting on the planned reception of the pieces and the expected display in Sicily ("La Venere di Morgantina torna in Sicilia", ANSA January 27, 2010).

University Art Museums and Collecting Antiquities

I have already commented on Kimerly Rorschach's views on the policies of the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD). She has written in more detail about the role of university art museums:

We believe that classical antiquities have tremendous educational and aesthetic value, even when removed from their original context and even when their original context is unknown.

At the same time she acknowledges the issue of looted antiquities and notes that university museum curators

must take account of the interests of our colleagues in other scholarly fields, especially since our teaching mission as university museums relies on the ability and willingness of faculty and students in these fields to work with the objects we collect.

I take heart from the fact that she has doubts about the AAMD's report on the "Acquisition of Archaeological Materials and Ancient Art" (see "Loan Exhibitions and Transparency") and the proposed "ten-year rule" (as opposed to accepting the UNESCO 1970 Convention as the cut-off point; see "Cultural Ceasefire: is 1970 the right date?"). She sounds a warning note:

To base our policies on these current AAMD guidelines creates too much risk and too much exposure for both the university museum and the parent institution.

The returns of antiquities from Princeton University Art Museum and the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville have highlighted these very issues concerning both loans and acquisitions.

Rorschach is also perceptive. She closes with these words:

To disregard the cultural patrimony concerns of other countries, whether or not we share them, only compounds ill will toward the United States. For university museums especially, it seems clear to me that collecting undocumented antiquities at the present time cannot be condoned.

Reference
Rorschach, K. 2007. "Scylla or Charybdis: antiquities collecting by university art museums." In The acquisition and exhibition of classical antiquities: professional, legal, and ethical perspectives, edited by R. F. Rhodes, pp. 65-73. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press.

Homecomings: Additions to the Exhibition

Elisabetta Povoledo ("Tempelsman Sculptures Return to Italy", New York Times, February 26, 2008) has reported on the display of the acrolithic sculptures once owned by Maurice Tempelsman and previously on loan to the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville. They will be displayed alongside other ex-Tempelsman material in the "Nostoi" exhibition in Rome.

Povoledo also reports:

The [Tempelsman] statues ... arrived in Rome on Friday along with nine classical antiquities from the private collection of the New York philanthropist Shelby White that were ceded to Italy in January under a separate pact. Italy says Ms. White’s artifacts were also looted from Italian soil.

"Cultural property is a modern political construct"

James Cuno, president and director of the Art Institute of Chicago, made the claim, "Cultural property is a modern political construct", at a debate in March 2006 (see "Is It All Loot? Tackling The Antiquities Problem", New York Times, March 29, 2006).

The reason? He was wanting to dismiss the claims by Italy on various antiquities.

Cuno continued:

Italy is making claims on objects that are, in the case of the Euphronios krater, 2,500 years old. The state itself is only 170 years old.

The discussion is dated; it is nearly two years old. Since the statements by Cuno, Philippe de Montebello, and Kwame Anthony Appiah, there have been returns from Boston, the Getty, the Princeton University Art Museums, and the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville. Indeed a selection of antiquities formerly owned by these great institutions are now on exhibition in Rome.

But why did Cuno care so much about antiquities claimed by Italy?

Perhaps he remembered the acquisition of fragments of Greek figure-decorated pottery when he was director of Harvard's art museums. Back in 1998 Culture Without Context reported:

Harvard Museums have recently put on display a 1995 purchase of 182 fifth-century BC Greek vase fragments. The director of Harvard's art museums, James Cuno, argued that the pieces had probably been removed from Italy before 1971, the date at which the Harvard acquisitions code took effect, and which forbids the purchase of material of questionable provenance. The fragments were bought on the advice of museum curator David Mitten from a New York dealer who had in turn purchased them from Robert Guy, of the University of Oxford, who could only have obtained them after 1971. Guy's name has in the past been linked to those of dealers Robin Symes and Herbert Cahn. Mitten has also purchased several unprovenanced antiquities from Robert Hecht ... Innocent until proven guilty claims Cuno. Guilty by association counter his critics.

I went back through my archive of material and found Walter V. Robinson and John Yemma, "Harvard museum acquisitions shock scholars", Boston Globe, January 16, 1998. There the report made the point:

Harvard's museums have been acquiring undocumented objects from an international dealer so notorious for dealing in looted artifacts that he was barred from Italy for almost a decade. The museums' director said he sees no reason to sever ties to the dealer.

Talking about the 182 fragments Cuno was quoted:

The decision I took was, I thought, a very ethical one and I would stand by it and do it again, ... If we hadn't acquired them, they might be in some private collection lord knows where. No one would know about them; no one would learn from them. Then what service would I have done?

Indeed,

Cuno acknowledged that despite Guy's expertise, he provided Harvard with no documentation regarding the origin of the fragments. Nor could he say where they came from - a dead giveaway, archeologists say, that the items are unclean. Cuno said Guy had obtained them from friends, including dealers, over several decades - a suggestion they might have been in Guy's possession before Harvard's policy took effect in 1971.

The Globe also reported on a 1996 Harvard exhibition, The Fire of Hephaistos:

That Harvard might have compromised its ethical standards has provoked debate within its fine arts faculty. A 1996 Sackler exhibition prompted a formal objection on ethical grounds by Irene J. Winter, then chair of the fine arts department. The exhibition comprised bronzes on loan from collectors - including Harvard benefactors Leon Levy and Shelby White - whose purchases of undocumented antiquities have prompted as much debate as the prices they pay.

In her 1996 letter to Cuno, Winter raised questions about the dubious origin of several of the pieces, including one bronze owned by Levy and White, which, she noted, had been "purchased in clear contravention of international convention, for which its purchasers have shown consistent disregard over the years." Levy and White have insisted that their acquisitions have been proper.

I presume that one of the pieces was the bronze "Portrait Head of a Youth" (cat. no. 31) reported as "Found in Suffolk, in southeastern England; purchased in 1988" (see "Private collectors are a potential threat to our cultural heritage").

And what was Cuno's view about the acquisitions?

It's out of the ground ... It's out of the country of origin. It's on the market. We're a public institution. Our job is to encourage research and preservation. If you don't acquire it, where would it go? Back to the netherworld of private holdings in conditions inimical to its preservation.

The Globe was quite prophetic and the report included this gem of a quotation from Harvard's David G. Mitten:

I don't think there is any reason to question Hecht's credentials ... We have bought from Bob Hecht and will continue to do so. He's very square with us. We have every reason to believe him.

Is cultural property safe when such views are expressed?

From Virginia to Sicily: update

The BBC has reported that the acroliths in the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville will be returned to Sicily in February 2008 ("Looted sculptures to be sent home", BBC, January 4, 2008). They are reported to have been looted from Aidone (Morgantina).

Malcolm Bell III is quoted:

The repatriation of the sculptures is especially appropriate and important as they can be put back in their original historical, cultural and religious context.

While it is true that they will be displayed in an appropriate setting, the physical context and the precise relationships between these acroliths and other items has been lost.

The BBC is surprisingly a little vague about the path from Sicily to Virginia:

What is not known is how the statues made their way from Sicily to Virginia.

It is thought that they made their way via the black market of looted antiquities to Switzerland before surfacing in London in 1980.

Reports say they were eventually handed to the University of Virginia's art museum by a New York philanthropist.

In fact the pathway has been widely reported (see "From Virginia to Sicily: more returning antiquities"):

The Viriginia sculptures are reported to have been looted from Morgantina in the 1970s (and said to have been seen in the boot of a car in 1979). They then surfaced in the hands of Robin Symes who sold them (in 1980) to Maurice Tempelsman (for a reported US$1 million).

The timing of this return coincides with the display of ex-Tempelsman items in a Rome exhibition which marks the return of antiquities from various North American collections.

Image from the BBC

2007: looking back

This has been an eventful year. Research with Christopher Chippindale (and published in 2000) had presented indicators for the "history" and "archaeology" of antiquities. One of the contemporary collections that we had explored had belonged to Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman: it was subsequently sold (or donated) to the J. Paul Getty Museum. Part of the Fleischman collection was returned to Italy from the Getty in 2007 confirming our earlier hypothesis.

Peter Watson has drawn attention to the role of Giacomo Medici. Watson's exploration of the movement of antiquities has created the climate in which North American museums have agreed to return objects to Italy. The expanded Getty list reflected a willingness to resolve the dispute (and see the discussion of the 2006 list). To these have been added antiquities from the Princeton University Art Museum and the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville. But objects have not just been recovered from public institutions: some have been returned from a North American dealer (Royal Athena Galleries) and a Swiss private collection. A selection of these pieces have just gone on display in Rome this December.

These objects have lost their archaeological contexts, and one of the main reasons for their return will be to deter museums and private collectors from acquiring recently-surfaced objects. Yet the sale of the Guennol lion at Sotheby's has perhaps encouraged some to see antiquities as a "hot" investment. Auctions continue to be an important outlet for antiquities. The decision by Bonham's to withdraw a Lydian silver kyathos from its October sale is a reminder that suspect pieces do still emerge on the market. Bonham's do not so far seem to have offered an explanation of how the piece was offered for sale. A restraining organisation for the market should be the Art Loss Register. Can recently surfaced antiquities be offered certificates with any sense of security?

2007 has seen the closure of the Illicit Antiquities Research Centre in Cambridge though I expect Colin Renfrew and Neil Brodie will continue to contribute to the discussion. Culture Without Context has been an important source of comment and record.

One of the solutions to prevent and restrict looting lies in increased legislation and import controls. In 2007 the US government signed a new memorandum with Cyprus. This move, designed to limit the level of looting on the island, has met with fierce opposition from bodies representing coin-dealers and coin-collectors who have taken legal action against the US State Department. The case has served to remind archaeologists that there are strongly-held views on the "right" to collect whatever the material and intellectual consequences.

Into this mix have emerged the complexities of forging Egyptian antiquities, and the long-running disputes over cultural property that left their countries of origin before international agreements.

What will 2008 hold?

Image courtesy of the Princeton University Art Museum.
Red figure psykter (ceramic), attributed to the Kleophrades Painter. Greek, Attic, ca. 510-500 B.C. One of four objects to be transferred in title to the Italian government but to remain on loan to the Princeton University Art Museum.

A lesson from Virginia

The report in The Cavalier Daily ("Behind the masks: The University must explain the mystery of the Morgantina masks", Tuesday September 4, 2007) concerning the announced returns - or are they? - from the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville raises some interesting questions.

Although the New York Times has linked the "masks" with the collector Maurice Tempelsman,

"The University Art Museum acknowledges that the masks are on loan from an anonymous donor and that an agreement exists between the museum and the unnamed donor that limits the loan to a period of five years, after which the museum can do with the masks what it sees fit."

Has the time come for museums to refuse to accept loans from donors who require that their identities remain anonymous? This is not the first time I have come across the phenomenon, and I doubt it will be the last.

The Virginia Return: could this have been anticipated?

The announcement of the return of antiquities from the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville could perhaps have been expected.

Back in June Elisabetta Povoledo ("Antiquities Trial Fixes on Collectors’ Role", New York Times, June 9, 2007) reported that as part of the True / Hecht trial in Rome:

"the prosecutors have clearly adopted a strategy of calling attention to collectors, especially well-heeled Americans, with the implicit message that every player in the global antiquities trade is within their sights."

So who are the North American collectors? Four examples were cited:

"the Texas oilmen Nelson Bunker Hunt and William Herbert Hunt (who sold their artifacts at auction in 1990 after their fortunes collapsed); the New York diamond merchant Maurice Tempelsman; the art philanthropist Lawrence Fleischman and his wife, Barbara; and the financier Leon Levy and his wife, Shelby White."

Barbara Fleischman responded to the claim in the NYT:

“It seems like anyone can accuse anyone of anything without any proof. We collected for the pure joy of the object.”

Povoledo continued that Fleischman "said that she and her husband, who died in 1997, never suspected that they might be buying anything less than legitimate."

But it looks as if there was proof. The appearance of Fleischman material in the Geneva Polaroids is likely to be part of the evidence. In any case the 40 antiquities about to be returned from the Getty to Italy include 13 antiquities formerly owned by the Fleischmans.

Former Tempelsman material is also in the list of antiquities to be returned from the Getty. Is the Virginia return an extension of that line of enquiry?

And where does it leave Shelby White?

From Virginia to Sicily: more returning antiquities

Elisabetta Povoledo has today reported on the return of two antiquities to Sicily from the University of Virginia Art Museum in Charlottesville ("Two Marble Sculptures to Return to Sicily", New York Times, September 1, 2007).

The two sixth-century BCE sculptures will be displayed in the archaeological museum at Aidone. They will be joined by other antiquities returning from North American collections: the "Morgantina" silver (now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), and an acrolitihic statue in the J. Paul Getty Museum.

The Viriginia sculptures are reported to have been looted from Morgantina in the 1970s (and said to have been seen in the boot of a car in 1979). They then surfaced in the hands of Robin Symes who sold them (in 1980) to Maurice Tempelsman (for a reported US$1 million).

Antiquities from the former Tempelsman collection form part of the agreement with the J. Paul Getty Museum. Symes has also been associated with many of the returning objects from North America - and indeed others which are still under investigation.

What other agreements can be expected in the coming months?