In a surprisingly rapid response to Egypt’s threats to withdraw cooperation with the Louvre, the French Museum has now agreed to the return of five fresco fragments, admitting that there are now serious doubts over their provenance.

From:
Bloomberg

France to Give Back to Egypt Five Artifacts Bought by Louvre
By Farah Nayeri

Oct. 9 (Bloomberg) — France said it is returning to Egypt five fresco fragments acquired by the Louvre Museum, saying there were “serious doubts” about their provenance, and responding to Egyptian demands for their return.

The 35-member commission overseeing France’s national museum collections met today, and unanimously agreed that the fresco fragments from the wall of a prince’s tomb must be given back, the culture ministry said in an e-mailed release. Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand has decided to return them.
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Sharon Waxman, author of Loot, looks at the Metropolitan Museum’s upcoming change of director & how the museum might handle future cultural property restitution claims.

From:
New York Times

Op-Ed Contributor
How Did That Vase Wind Up in the Metropolitan?
By SHARON WAXMAN
Published: December 1, 2008
Los Angeles

THE imminent arrival of Thomas Campbell as the director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art is much more than a simple changing of the guard after the long tenure of his predecessor, Philippe de Montebello. Mr. Campbell, who will take over one month from today, is a 46-year-old curator from the Met’s department of European sculpture and decorative arts, and he has a unique opportunity to shift the tone of an enduring and increasingly hostile debate in the world of art and museums: Who should own the treasures of antiquity?

Up to now, the parties on either side of this dispute have stood in opposing corners with their fingers in their ears. The governments of Italy and Turkey have filed lawsuits to force the return of plundered and looted artworks. Egypt has threatened to suspend excavation permits if iconic artifacts are not repatriated. Greece has built a new museum in Athens in large part to justify its renewed demands for the return of the Elgin Marbles from Britain.
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A review of James Cuno’s new book in the Financial Times gives the impression that the provenance of all artefacts is somewhat vague. This seems to be a grossly inaccurate statement, which ignores the vast numbers of artefacts with clearly traceable provenance, whilst attempting to legitimise the position of museums & institutions of the west who hold onto artefacts whose provenance is many levels below murky.

David Gill expands on this on his blog.

From:
Financial Times

Who Owns Antiquity?
Review by Christian Tyler
Published: August 4 2008 08:08 | Last updated: August 4 2008 08:08
Who Owns Antiquity? Museums and the Battle over our Ancient Heritage
By James Cuno
Princeton University Press £14.95, 265 pages
FT Bookshop price: £11.95

The provenance of antiquities has always been murky. In the past, it didn’t stop museums from acquiring great collections. These days, it is such a political issue that curators have to work hard to defend what their museums already hold, let alone add to their collections.

Many governments are nationalising the antiquities in their countries – by criminalising private possession, banning exports and demanding the restitution of objects which have been held abroad for years.
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More coverage of the acquisition guidelines for US museums, brought in largely to try & avoid repeats of some of the court cases that have occurred in recent years. These are however still only guidelines, so museums are free to ignore them & they don’t apply retroactively.

From:
Artinfo

New Guidelines for Collecting Antiquities
By ARTINFO
Published: June 4, 2008

NEW YORK—After a year and a half of discussions, the Association of Art Museum Directors has announced new guidelines for collecting antiquities, reports the New York Times. The new policy uses 1970, the year UNESCO ratified a landmark convention prohibiting trade in illegal antiquities, as its starting point, saying a museum “normally should not” acquire a work unless it has solid proof that the object was outside of its country of probable modern discovery before 1970, or that the object was legally exported from its country of probable modern discovery after 1970.
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Stricter guidelines have been announced by the Association of Art Museum Directors in the USA. These revised guidelines will not of course apply retrospectively to the huge numbers of acquisitions with which many institutions are filled that took place before these guidelines were implemented.

From:
New Yorks Times

Museums Set Stricter Guidelines for Acquiring Antiquities
By RANDY KENNEDY
Published: June 4, 2008

After a year and half of deliberations, the directors of the country’s largest art museums will announce new guidelines on Wednesday for how their institutions should collect antiquities, a volatile issue that has led in recent years to international cultural skirmishes and several highly publicized art restitution cases.

The Association of Art Museum Directors, whose 190 members also include leaders of Canadian and Mexican museums, says the new policy will probably make it even more difficult for museums to build antiquities collections through purchases or, as is more often the case, through gifts and bequests from wealthy private collectors. But they assert that the change will help stanch the flow of objects illegally dug up from archaeological sites or other places.
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