"Christie's has not been notified ... we plan to proceed with the sale of these lots"

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But then who would be seen bidding for them? The "lots" are three Greek and Roman antiquities being sold in a Christies auction in New York on June 10 as part of a larger sale of antiquities. Archaeologists and an Italian prosecutor are calling for Christie's International to withdraw these three because there is clear evidence that they were in the stock of a convicted dealer in illicitly obtained antiquities and it seems inherently likely that, like much of the material he was selling, they came from illicit excavations in Italy and left Italy without an export licence (Dalya Alberge, 'Critics Say Christie's Should Pull 3 Items From Auction', Wall Street Journal June 4 2010). The items are:

A Roman marble torso sculpted in the second century AD, an Apulian drinking-cup from the fourth century BC and a Greek terracotta figure of a goddess made in the third century BC [...]. The Christie's website gives the provenance of the Greek goddess, estimated at $8,000, as a 1984 London sale. It notes that the Apulian cup, valued at some $35,000, is "the property of an American private collector" and that it was sold in New York in 1994. Of the Roman youth, valued around $30,000, Christie's notes previous sales after 1992 and says it is now "the property of a Massachusetts private collector."

The three artefacts appear among thousands of Polaroid photographs of looted antiquities (the Medici archive) confiscated from the premises of art dealer Giacomo Medici in a 1995 Italian police raid. Mr. Medici was sentenced in Italy in 2004 to 10 years in prison for dealing in stolen artifacts.

Paolo Ferri, a Rome prosecutor specializing in art-theft cases seeking to recover the objects, described the Christie's sale as "very unethical". "Christie's knows they are selling objects that appeared in the Medici archive," Mr. Ferri said.David Gill, reader in Mediterranean Archaeology at Swansea University in Wales, has called for Christie's to withdraw the objects as "the moral and ethical thing to do". Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn (Professor Colin Renfrew of Cambridge university) said Christie's should withdraw the objects from sale, "The auction houses are doing themselves no favors in continuing to offer tainted antiquities for sale", he said.

A Christie's spokeswoman in New York said the auction house plans to go ahead with the sale. "With respect to these particular lots, Christie's has not been notified of a title claim by any government authority, nor are these lots identified as problematic by the Art Loss Register or Interpol," she said. "As an added measure, Christie's has undertaken its own research into this matter and has found no evidence to support the need to withdraw these lots. Unless and until Christie's receives a title claim, we plan to proceed with the sale of these lots".

Here we see a very clear example of the no-questions-asked antiquities trade in operation. The question asked of Christies is where they say these items were before they "surfaced" (from "underground") recently, what is their provenance. Christies are not answering those questions, though the seller claims to have "done its own research". The results of that research however are not being made available, its all behind closed doors, like the discussions on the internet between collectors, like everything else about this shady secretive trade. This goes from the big London auction houses and galleries selling huge chunks of "ancient art" to the petty Wisconsin dealer in dugup Roman coins.

Christies appears to be claiming they have "evidence" that although these items are pictured in the Medici archives, they arrived in Medici's stock by legitimate means, so why can they not say so outright? Why can they not release that information now it has pointed out that these items were in Medici's stock?

Or should we take note of the innocent-until-proven-guilty negative "With respect to these particular lots, Christie's has not been notified of a title claim by any government authority, nor are these lots identified as problematic by the Art Loss Register or Interpol [...] Christie's [...] has found no evidence to support the need to withdraw these lots"? But negative evidence is never proof of anything (like the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster), what is needed here is transparency allowing it to be determined the items have been on the licit market and arrived there by legitimate means.

So, question, if you are an ethical collector, would you be going along to the Christies sale in New York on June 10th and sit in a room with the people who, despite all the publicity, will be bidding on these items? Would you sit under the same roof as the Christie's employees with their smug 'they-can't-touch-us-for-it' smiles? What would that mark you as? Would you buy stocks in a firm like Christies (or trust the people involved as anonymous buyers and sellers in this activity) after this type of publicity? Good for the Wall Street Journal for airing this issue.
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See also Looting matters on this Wall Street Journal news item: Italian Prosecutor: "We want to repatriate those objects"

Where is the ICE, asleep?

Vignette: American antiques auction (Norman Rockwell)