Asian "art collector" apprehended

The Phnom Penh Post recently reported that a 34-year-old man from Banteay Meanchey suspected of illegally hunting for ancient artefacts at Angkor Wat was arrested and will appear in court at Siem Reap. Chea Sophart, a deputy director of the Heritage Police, said man identified only as Ryn was arrested “while using an electric-powered machine to collect artefacts about 400 metres northeast of Takeo temple”. This wasn't the first case of thievery at the temple. Ryn is quoted as saying that on 10 previous occasions he had collected statues and other artefacts from the Banteay Chhmar temple compound in Banteay Meanchey province, which he then sold to Thai clients. An investigation into a suspected gang of artefact thieves is now under way. Ryn could face a prison term of between one and three years if convicted. The dealers and collectors who no-questions-asking buy the sawn off bits of SE Asian monuments as classy (sic) exotic home decoration are probably risking no punishment whatsoever in their own countries.

Photos: Legitimate, looted or fake? Some of the many sculptural fragments on sale today - funny how its most often the heads. Do bodhisattvas have no buttocks?

American investigators' Brasso unexplained

It's now about a month since I enquired of the US team led by Roger Bagnall of New York University who were excavating at the town of Amheida in Egypt why they were reported as scouring Roman coins with "brasso". No explanation however was ever forthcoming. Perhaps the local Inspector has some explanation. Was the mistake the US journalist's or of the New York excavator? Just another of those mysteries of the archaeology of ancient Egypt, I guess.
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The picture used in Dr Bagnall's recent presentation is believed to be the only surviving representation of a Roman "Brasso" party. See how they shine.

Cultural Property Research Institute to “Link People and Culture”

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The Cultural Property Research Institute (CPRI), run from a downtown New Mexico lawyer's office and apparently the offspring of the defunct ACCP, has announced that in 2009 it will “initiate research into a number of important cultural policy issues” which it claims will “Link People and Culture”. These include:

“Exploring ways to harmonize US laws and regulations that apply to transfer and ownership of antiquities”. This will explore the use of the different U.S. domestic laws in the protection of the archaeological heritage. Many of our archaeological colleagues in the States argue that the current system is fragmentary and inconsistent and loopholes and inconsistencies mean that it fails to offer holistic protection to the archaeological heritage of the US. The CPRI will "provide summaries and analyses useful to museums, educational institutions and the general public". Perhaps it will highlight some of the inconsistencies in a way which will ease the process of beneficial change to provide stronger protection. Let’s hope so.

Exploring the effect of various national preservation policies on damage to archaeological sites and objects.National policies “toward development, private ownership, enforcement and export, among other matters, can have profound consequences for the integrity of archaeological sites and the preservation of individual objects”. The CPRI intends to gather and collate information on such policies in “a small, selected group” of countries to determine “their effect on site damage (sic), and possible remedies (sic)”. It makes one wonder by what criteria they will be “selecting” that small group of countries to cover a globally representative range of legal and social contexts. Let us hope the USA is one of them. Just how well are US policies protecting the archaeological heritage against development, private ownership enforcement and export and how that compares with other countries?

“Developing different models for a registry that can be applied to privately-owned objects”. It is good to see that the Institute recognizes that the main problem with the current status quo of the antiquities market is the total lack of transparency about (and lack of real interest among most collectors in) where antiquities on the market are coming from. This means that illicitly obtained artefacts can be peddled undetected alongside those of legitimate provenience. Some means of properly registering collections and objects in them allowing the tracing of proveniences of objects coming onto the market is clearly a way forward. Portable antiquity dealers are adamant that they will not themselves adopt such a system, so it is good to see the lawyers taking a more amenable stance towards such ideas. “The CPRI will pull together, explain and compare the models that have been proposed and others that may also serve the purpose of inclusive registry. A draft report will be published on the CPRI website by the end of 2009”. That’s something to look forward to. A register beginning with the location of legitimately-obtained artifacts on 31st Dec 2010 would be a neater and more practical watershed than the 1970 date of the UNESCO convention, and better than nothing.

A fourth topic the CPRI intends to examine is “Determining the number of artistically and academically significant, privately-owned objects in the United States” that because of ethical considerations are currently excluded from acquisition by US museums.
The CPRI uses the euphemism “orphan objects” to refer to items that have no documented provenance (“those that cannot by self-rule be acquired or accepted as loans by US museums”) [“self rule”?]. That in itself speaks volumes. They say that the number of such items in private collections and on the US market “continues to grow”, now wait a minute… surely a research institute of this nature might here – before it addresses ANY other topic – ask and answer for the public just why that is so. Passing over that question in silence would be a meaningful omission. Nevertheless at present that is what the CPRI website does. The CPRI merely see the need to compile “accurate data on the nature and volume” of artistically and academically significant material in private hands. This research aim however is unclearly formulated. Quite apart from defining what (and for whom) is "artistically and academically significant" the scope of this survey is left undefined. While initially it is stated that it will cover US private and commercial holdings, it then goes on to say it will look at the scale of the phenomenon “in a particular cultural/historical area, with a view toward establishing credible order-of-magnitude figures, over time, for all cultural/historical areas”. Areas of the USA? Perhaps all will become clear when “initial conclusions" are "published on the CPRI website by the end of 2009”.

Now sadly, I personally see nothing in the proposals for the first four research topics of this "Institute" which really would in their own right actually go any way to "linking people with culture". 380 km away in Blanding in the next state there has been a major action by the authorities to counter the destruction of archaeological contexts of significance by antiquity collectors and dealers, this would seem to be a useful place for an institute concerned with researching and educating about cultural property and its significance to begin its outreach. Why all the attention paid to the legislations of foreign "source countries" when there is so much to do and so much scope for useful work at home?

These CPRI projects have also been commented on by David Gill. [I thought the question about the donation by US private collectors of objects to museums in the "source countries" they had been taken from rather than the United States was a particularly apt one].

Photo: The Institute's headquarters, 215 W. San Francisco St. Suite 202c.

"Orphan objects"

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The CPRI calls collectable ancient objects which have no provenence "orphan objects". But they all came from somewhere - no ancient artefacts grow on trees. The truth is that they have been decontextualised, their provenances discarded by the dealers that sell them. So who or what has "orphaned" these objects?

One of the principles of human trafficking is to take the victims' passports away so they have no means of identification and nowhere to turn. Let us not forget that the same organized crime groups that are among those that smuggle antiquities from the source countries to no-questions-asked dealers in the richer market countries do not necessarily make their money from breaking laws and conventions concerning trafficking portable antiquities alone.

Photo: campaign poster from article: "Human Sex Trafficking Happens in Rhode Island".

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Germany: turning a blind eye to 'Antikenhehlerei'?

A few days ago the gold vial which a German antiquity dealer [ancient coin auction house Hirsch Nachfolger] claims (but has not demonstrated) came from "Troy" and which German expert Michel Muller-Karpe says has most likely been looted from Ur in Iraq has been handed over to a government-appointed evaluator. The future destination of this object will be determined by what the evaluator decides. The topic has received some media attention in Germany. English-speaking readers can find an interesting report by Martin Beutler “Looted treasures from Iraq on sale in Germany” in the first 7.05 minutes of this video... The attached forum asks "should the trade in all artefacts of unclear origins be banned [or is this already a lost cause]?”

The video features a number of cameo interviews from both sides of the issue. Michael Muller Karpe is a key figure:

"the archaeologist from Mainz is convinced that most of the antiquities on offer in auction catalogues are stolen, their origins are often not made clear; "They are simply labelled Mesopotamia, or Babylonia or Assyria. Legally obtained artefacts have a specific site of origin, with illegal objects, the source isn't mentioned for a good reason".

There is a spokesman from the Iraqi embassy (note what he has on the shelf behind him) expressing hope that the situation over this item can be resolved amicably by diplomatically acceptable means.

There is an appearance from Daniel Gerlach, an orientalist from Berlin, he has been looking into the trafficking of antiquities and identifies Germany as a place where the trail breks off due to the lack of transparency in the market. He says “The authorities really need to change the way they think […] sometimes I get the impression that politically the aim is to keep public attention away from this issue”. I would say that is a fair assessment of the situation too in other 'no-questions-asked antiquity'-hungry 'market' countries, including the UK and the US.

Astrid Muller Katzenburg is an attorney for the Association of German Antique Dealers. As is the wont of lawyers serving the trade she comes out with the same old arguments we hear from the whole pro-collecting lobby, that dealers want to "preserve works of art" taken from archaeological contexts (for which rthey have an "affinity") and denies the market is as profitable as some preservationists estimate. She also denies that Germany is a major market for stolen Iraqi artefacts (where have we heard that before?). While she castigates opponents of the no-questions-asked trade as not applying "logical arguments", she is depicted by this report as not however answering the point about the trade in illicit items and the lack of transparency of the market.

The final word however belongs to Muller-Karpe:

"In Germany, Hehlerei [fencing of stolen goods] is a punishable offence. If you buy a stolen car radio you are punished, but if you buy a stolen cylinder seal, or clay tablet, you are not charged- you are celebrated as fostering science when you publicly exhibit the stolen item. That's just not right".

So far the German government has on the whole been dragging its feet over taking action against the no-questions-asked trade in illegally obtained portable antiquities across and within its borders, does this mean that the German government and people agree or disagree that it's "just not right" to trade in them?

Old wine in new skins: the "Cultural Policy Research Institute"

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In the middle of March this year, coin collecting lawyer Peter Tompa broke the news of a comeback by the American Council for Cultural Policy ("ACCP to Restart in Response to Plea by Noted Academic for Inclusive, Neutral Forum?") . I commented on it here at the time. Tompa wrote:

"Cultural Property Observer" has learned that former members and supporters of the American Council for Cultural Policy indicate a growing interest in creating a neutral forum for the discussion of preserving cultural sites and antiquities in Afghanistan that appears to be otherwise unavailable elsewhere. […] Former members of the ACCP indicate that given the apparent inability of any other NGO to provide an inclusive, neutral forum of the nature that is needed, they have begun to discuss the reactivation of the ACCP for this purpose.

Apparently they realized that keeping the old name might be a bit of a hindrance to credibility, this it seems is the genesis of a new body with the grandiose title of an “Institute” and dropping the nationalist adjective “American”. Thus we get the “Cultural Policy Research Institute" - “a 501(3)(c) nonprofit organization - a public charity dedicated to advancing public education and understanding of the issues that underlie the ownership and disposition of cultural property”. Well, of course what is the main issue is not so much the "ownership", but origins of the coveted items. I wonder to what extent the new group will be educating and enhancing US "understanding" of those issues?

“The Institute brings together distinguished legal specialists, museum professionals, academics, archaeologists, collectors, arts specialists and members of the public to build a viable legal framework for the protection of world historical remains”. Hmmm. “The Institute will receive financial support from individuals, foundations and organizations”. Like the ACCP, the focus seems to largely be on the US collector and US collections.

Apart from its “Board of Directors” there will be “a nonvoting Advisory Board that includes scholars in the fields of art history and archaeology; museum officials, staff and volunteers; art collectors; professionals in the art trade; and legal specialists with knowledge of specific relevance to the purpose of the organization”. With regard the focus of the ACCG FOI request it will be interesting to see how transparent the CuPRI is about the recommendations of the archaeologists on its own advisory board (not named on the website).

According to its website, this “institute” has five “directors”:
William Pearlstein (corporate attorney - former ACCP, - CPRI Board of Directors member)
Peter K. Tompa (attorney - CPRI Legal Officer)
Anne Metcalf (Metcalf Federal Relations, "bringing the needs and issues of cultural, educational and natural resource organizations before government" - Secretary)
Arthur A. Houghton (former Getty curator, former ACCP - CPIR President)
Kate Fitz Gibbon (attorney, former ACCP Advisory Board - CPRI Vice-President, whose office coincidentally has the same address as the CPRI’s)


One might wonder at an international research institute concerning items taken from archaeological contexts whose board of directors is composed largely of US lawyers who from their own CVs on the CuPRI website seem to have no experience of running a research institute, let alone one concerning archaeology.
More to the point, one would have thought that a group of cultural property lawyers producing a "resource" purporting to present international legislation concerning cultural property might have got their legal facts right. For many of the countries whose legislation they have found texts to reproduce on their website, the laws are lamentably out of date (e.g., Cambodia, Australia and most significantly [see above] Afghanistan) or incomplete (Great Britain). There is much fuller and up-to-date resource of the legislation containing summaries and full texts on the International Foundation for Art Research (IFAR) Art & Cultural Property Educational Resources, to which CPRI can more usefully point their users.

But meanwhile, where oh where has Mr. Barford gone?

"But meanwhile, where oh where has Mr. Barford gone?" asks Missouri portable antiquities dealer Wayne Sayles. Though I see that instead of missing me, Sayles merely demands that I answer some question or other of his. So where have I been? Basically taking a break, leaving my computer at home and driving across half of Europe, in the process doing a (pre)-Romanesque church crawl, exploring twisting medieval side streets of half timbered towns, deploring some modern development of the same, sitting at various foreign tables with my family and museum colleagues and friends enjoying traditional meals from local produce washed down with the local traditional brews, in general, enjoying a bit of cultural heritage. And I did not need to buy a single decontextualised coin or other artefact to do so. I guess that's the difference between us Europeans and Missourians.

Having a look at what's been happening 'on the blogs' while I was away, it seems I have mostly missed some sterile needling of David Gill and more attacks on Robyn by Wayne Sayles and Peter Tompa. Somehow I think getting out and about in the cultural landscape the preferable option.