Looted art
Encyclopedia
Looting
Looting —also referred to as sacking, plundering, despoiling, despoliation, and pillaging—is the indiscriminate taking of goods by force as part of a military or political victory, or during a catastrophe, such as during war, natural disaster, or rioting...
during war, natural disaster
Natural disaster
A natural disaster is the effect of a natural hazard . It leads to financial, environmental or human losses...
and riot
Riot
A riot is a form of civil disorder characterized often by what is thought of as disorganized groups lashing out in a sudden and intense rash of violence against authority, property or people. While individuals may attempt to lead or control a riot, riots are thought to be typically chaotic and...
for centuries. Looting of art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
, archaeology
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
and other cultural property may be an opportunistic criminal act, or may be a more organized case of unlawful or unethical pillage by the victor of a conflict.
"Looted art" is a term often reduced to refer to artwork plundered
Nazi plunder
Nazi plunder refers to art theft and other items stolen as a result of the organized looting of European countries during the time of the Third Reich by agents acting on behalf of the ruling Nazi Party of Germany. Plundering occurred from 1933 until the end of World War II, particularly by military...
by the Germans during World War II in Europe. However, the Nazis were neither the first nor the last to loot art on a large scale. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is the United States' official memorial to the Holocaust. Adjacent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the USHMM provides for the documentation, study, and interpretation of Holocaust history...
is on record with the following quote:
The Herald-Times
The Herald-Times
The Herald-Times is a daily newspaper serving Bloomington, Indiana and surrounding areas. The newspaper won the Blue Ribbon Daily award in 1975, 1984 and 2007, naming it the best daily newspaper in the state of Indiana in those years.-External links:**...
even claims: "Napoleon was a model for Hitler in terms of art looting." Bloomberg Radio also makes it clear, that many of the worlds greatest artworks were taken from their rightful owners.
Plunder, booty
Treasure
Treasure is a concentration of riches, often one which is considered lost or forgotten until being rediscovered...
, appropriation
Cultural appropriation
Cultural appropriation is the adoption of some specific elements of one culture by a different cultural group. It describes acculturation or assimilation, but can imply a negative view towards acculturation from a minority culture by a dominant culture. It can include the introduction of forms of...
and spoliation are related terms that have been used for several hundred years to describe the process of looting. Many references still associate the term looted art with the World War II period, recent legal frameworks and treaties use the term spoliation in connection with the "large number of cultural objects and works of art looted by the Nazis and others during the Second World War and the Holocaust Era from 1933–1945". The term "Trophy art" is used for the cultural objects, which were taken by the Red Army and the Soviet Trophy Brigades from occupied Germany to the Soviet Union after World War II. It is a translation from the Russian "Трофейное искусство".
Related terms include art theft
Art theft
Art theft is usually for the purpose of resale or for ransom . Stolen art is sometimes used by criminals to secure loans.. One must realize that only a small percentage of stolen art is recovered. Estimates range from 5 to 10%. This means that little is known about the scope and characteristics of...
(the stealing of valuable artifacts, mostly because of commercial reasons), illicit antiquities (covertly traded antiquities or artifacts of archaeological interest, found in illegal or unregulated excavations), provenance
Provenance
Provenance, from the French provenir, "to come from", refers to the chronology of the ownership or location of an historical object. The term was originally mostly used for works of art, but is now used in similar senses in a wide range of fields, including science and computing...
(the origin or source of a piece of art), and art repatriation
Art repatriation
Art repatriation is the return of art or cultural objects, usually referring to ancient or looted art, to their country of origin or former owners . The disputed cultural property items are physical artifacts of a group or society that were taken from another group usually in an act of looting,...
(the process of returning artworks and antiques to their rightful owners).
History
Looting
Looting —also referred to as sacking, plundering, despoiling, despoliation, and pillaging—is the indiscriminate taking of goods by force as part of a military or political victory, or during a catastrophe, such as during war, natural disaster, or rioting...
has a long history, the winning party of armed conflicts often plundering the loser, and in the absence of social order, the local population often joining in. The contents of nearly all the tombs of the Pharaoh
Pharaoh
Pharaoh is a title used in many modern discussions of the ancient Egyptian rulers of all periods. The title originates in the term "pr-aa" which means "great house" and describes the royal palace...
s were already completely looted by grave robbers before the invasion of Egypt by Alexander the Great in 332 BCE. There have been a total of seven Sackings of Rome. The Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
includes several references to looting and to the looting of art and treasures, in the Book of Chronicles it is said that: "King Shishak
Shishak
Shishak or Susac or Shishaq is the biblical Hebrew form of the first ancient Egyptian name of a pharaoh mentioned in the Bible.-Shishak's Reign:...
of Egypt attacked Jerusalem and took away the treasures of the Lord's temple and of the royal palace; he took everything, including the gold shields that Solomon
Solomon
Solomon , according to the Book of Kings and the Book of Chronicles, a King of Israel and according to the Talmud one of the 48 prophets, is identified as the son of David, also called Jedidiah in 2 Samuel 12:25, and is described as the third king of the United Monarchy, and the final king before...
had made", and in the Book of Jeremiah
Book of Jeremiah
The Book of Jeremiah is the second of the Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible, following the book of Isaiah and preceding Ezekiel and the Book of the Twelve....
15:11 the Lord says: "Jerusalem, I will surely send you away for your own good. I will surely bring the enemy upon you in a time of trouble and distress ... I will give away your wealth and your treasures as plunder. I will give it away free of charge for the sins you have committed throughout your land." Other famous examples include the sack of Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...
by the Fourth Crusade
Fourth Crusade
The Fourth Crusade was originally intended to conquer Muslim-controlled Jerusalem by means of an invasion through Egypt. Instead, in April 1204, the Crusaders of Western Europe invaded and conquered the Christian city of Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire...
, the Sack of Baghdad in 1258
Battle of Baghdad (1258)
The Siege of Baghdad, which occurred in 1258, was an invasion, siege and sacking of the city of Baghdad, the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate at the time and the modern-day capital of Iraq, by the Ilkhanate Mongol forces along with other allied troops under Hulagu Khan.The invasion left Baghdad in...
, Hernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century...
and the looting of the Aztec
Aztec
The Aztec people were certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the late post-classic period in Mesoamerican chronology.Aztec is the...
gold. In only some of these was the removal of artworks for their own sake (rather than the value of their materials for example) a primary motivation.
Since the rise of an art market for monumental sculpture, abandoned monuments all over the world have been at risk, notably in Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
, the old territories of Mesoamerican culture and Cambodia.
After the looting of Europe by Napoleon others copied the institutionalized model of systematic plunder and looting. During the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
legal frameworks and guidelines emerged that justified and legalized the plunder and looting of opposing parties and nations. Henry Wager Halleck
Henry Wager Halleck
Henry Wager Halleck was a United States Army officer, scholar, and lawyer. A noted expert in military studies, he was known by a nickname that became derogatory, "Old Brains." He was an important participant in the admission of California as a state and became a successful lawyer and land developer...
, a United States Army officer, scholar, and lawyer argued: "No belligerent would be justifiable in destroying temples, tombs, statutes [sic], paintings, or other works of art (except so far as their destruction may be the accidental or necessary result of military operations.) But, may he not seize and appropriate to his own use such works of genius and taste as belong to the hostile state, and are of a moveable character?".
In July 1862, Francis Lieber
Francis Lieber
Francis Lieber , known as Franz Lieber in Germany, was a German-American jurist, gymnast and political philosopher. He edited an Encyclopaedia Americana...
, a professor at Columbia College
Columbia College of Columbia University
Columbia College is the oldest undergraduate college at Columbia University, situated on the university's main campus in Morningside Heights in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1754 by the Church of England as King's College, receiving a Royal Charter from King George II...
, who had worked with Halleck on guidelines for guerrilla warfare, was asked by Halleck, now General-in-Chief
General-in-Chief
General-in-Chief has been a military rank or title in various armed forces around the world.- France :In France, General-in-Chief was first an informal title for the lieutenant-general commanding over others lieutenant-generals, or even for some marshals in charge of an army...
of armies of the Union
Union Army
The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...
, to develop a code of conduct for the armed forces. The code of conduct, published as General Orders No. 100 on April 24, 1863, signed by United States President Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
, became later known as the Lieber Code
Lieber Code
The Lieber Code of April 24, 1863, also known as Instructions for the Government of Armies of the United States in the Field, General Order № 100, or Lieber Instructions, was an instruction signed by President Abraham Lincoln to the Union Forces of the United States during the American Civil War...
and specifically authorized the Armies of the United States to plunder and loot the enemy – a mindset that Hitler's armies copied one century later. The Lieber Code said in Article 36: "If such works of art, libraries, collections, or instruments belonging to a hostile nation or government, can be removed without injury, the ruler of the conquering state or nation may order them to be seized and removed for the benefit of the said nation. The ultimate ownership is to be settled by the ensuing treaty of peace." Russian and American forces relied on similar frameworks when they plundered Germany after the defeat of the Nazis.
The Lieber Code further defined the conditions of looting and the relationship between private plunder and booty and institutionalized looting "All captures and booty belong, according to the modern law of war, primarily to the government of the captor." (Article 45), "Neither officers nor soldiers are allowed to make use of their position or power in the hostile country for private gain, not even for commercial transactions otherwise legitimate." (Article 46) and "... [I]f large sums are found upon the persons of prisoners, or in their possession, they shall be taken from them, and the surplus, after providing for their own support, appropriated for the use of the army, under the direction of the commander, unless otherwise ordered by the government." (Article 72)
Massive art looting occurred during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, see art theft during World War II.
Looting of Afghanistan
Many art pieces and artifacts from Afghanistan were looted during several wars, scores of artworks were smuggled to Britain and sold to wealthy collectors. "There are also fears that the bulk of the collection once in Kabul MuseumKabul Museum
The National Museum of Afghanistan , also known as the Afghan National Museum or the Kabul Museum, is a two-story building located 9 km southwest of the center of Kabul City in Afghanistan. It was built in 1922 during the reign of King Amanullah Khan...
, ... is now in smugglers' or collectors' hands. The most famous exhibits were the Begram ivories
Begram ivories
The Begram ivories are a series of over a thousand decorative inlays, carved from ivory and bone and formerly attached to wooden furniture, excavated in the 1930s in Begram, Afghanistan...
, a series of exquisite Indian panels nearly 2,000 years old, excavated by French archaeologists in the Thirties." In November 2004 much of the missing collection numbering 22,513 items was found safely hidden. Over 200 crates had been moved downtown for storage at the end of the Soviet occupation including the Bactrian gold and Bagram Ivories. Some 228 of these treasures, including pieces of Bactrian Gold and many of the Bagram Ivories were exhibited at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC from May 25 to September 7, 2008.
Looting of Cyprus
Following the invasion of CyprusTurkish invasion of Cyprus
The Turkish invasion of Cyprus, launched on 20 July 1974, was a Turkish military invasion in response to a Greek military junta backed coup in Cyprus...
in 1974 by Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
, and the occupation of the northern part of the island churches belonging to the Cypriot Orthodox Church
Cypriot Orthodox Church
The Church of Cyprus is an autocephalous Greek church within the communion of Orthodox Christianity. It is one of the oldest Eastern Orthodox autocephalous churches, achieving independence from the Patriarchate of Antioch and All the East in 431...
have been looted in what is described as "…one of the most systematic examples of the looting of art since World War II". Several high profile cases have made headline news on the international scene. Most notable was the case of the Kanakaria mosaics, 6th century AD frescos that were removed from the original church, trafficked to the USA and offered for sale to a museum for the sum of US$20,000,000. These were subsequently recovered by the Orthodox Church following a court case in Indianapolis.
Looting of Germany
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
), is still causing disputes and conflicts between Germany, Russia and the United States, as many of the objects that Germans originally stole from museums, private collections and Holocaust victims have never been returned to Germany.
The Soviet plunder of Europe's art treasures constituted institutionalized revenge while the American military's role in the stealing of Europe's treasures mostly involved individuals looting for personal gain. The vast majority of the art taken by the allied forces from Germany was stolen by Germans from occupied countries less than a decade earlier. Irina Xorodila, the professor of Art History at the St. Petersburg University wrote "It is very hypocritical of Germans to demand back the art taken by Soviet troops during World War II that in the early 1940s was stolen by Germans from museums and individuals whose ashes cover Auschwitz, Treblinka and Sobibor."
The looting of Germany by the Soviet Union was not limited to official 'Trophy Brigades', but included many ordinary soldiers and officials who plundered for personal reasons. At least 2.5 million artworks and 10 million books and manuscripts disappeared in the Soviet Union and later in Russia, including but not limited to Gutenberg Bibles and Impressionist paintings once in German private collections. According to Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine the Soviets created special "hit lists ... of what the Soviet Union wanted" and followed the historical "examples" given by Napoleon, Hitler, British and American armies. Other estimates focus on German artworks and cultural treasures supposedly secured against bombing in safe places which were looted after World War II, detailing 200.000 works of art, 3 kilometers of archival material and 3 million books. By comparison, the German army looted 375 archival institutions, 402 museums, 531 institutes, and 957 libraries in Eastern Europe alone.
Germany's collections lost 180.000 artworks, which according to cultural experts are "being held in secret depots in Russia and Poland". The stolen artworks include sculptures by Nicola Pisano
Nicola Pisano
Nicola Pisano was an Italian sculptor whose work is noted for its classical Roman sculptural style. Pisano is sometimes considered to be the founder of modern sculpture.- Early life :His birth date or origins are uncertain...
, a reliefs by Donatello
Donatello
Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi , also known as Donatello, was an early Renaissance Italian artist and sculptor from Florence...
, Gothic
Gothic art
Gothic art was a Medieval art movement that developed in France out of Romanesque art in the mid-12th century, led by the concurrent development of Gothic architecture. It spread to all of Western Europe, but took over art more completely north of the Alps, never quite effacing more classical...
Madonnas
Madonna (art)
Images of the Madonna and the Madonna and Child or Virgin and Child are pictorial or sculptured representations of Mary, Mother of Jesus, either alone, or more frequently, with the infant Jesus. These images are central icons of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity where Mary remains...
,
paintings by Botticelli and Van Dyck and Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
works rendered in stone and wood. In 2007 Germany published a catalog of missing artworks to document the extent, prevent the resale, and speed up the return of the war booty. Berlin's State Museum alone lost around 400 artworks during World War II. The German state (Land) of Saxony-Anhalt
Saxony-Anhalt
Saxony-Anhalt is a landlocked state of Germany. Its capital is Magdeburg and it is surrounded by the German states of Lower Saxony, Brandenburg, Saxony, and Thuringia.Saxony-Anhalt covers an area of...
still maintains a list entitled "Beutekunst" (Looted Art) of more than 1000 missing paintings and books believed confiscated by the US or the Soviet Union.
Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
is also in possessions of some collections that Germany evacuated to remote places in Eastern Germany ( occupied Poland or Regained Territories). Among those there is large collection from Berlin, in Polish referred to as Berlinka
Berlinka (art collection)
The Berlinka is the Polish name for a German collection of historic material which was originally kept at the Preußische Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, the Prussian State Library at Berlin, but which is now kept in the Jagiellonian Library in Kraków....
. Another notable collection in Polish possession is Hermann Goering's collection of 25 historic airplanes (Deutsche Luftfahrt Sammlung) – ironically, it contains two Polish planes, captured by Germans during their invasion of Poland (including a PZL P-11c of Army Kraków). Poland refuses to return those collections to Germany unless Germany returns some of the collections looted in Poland and still in its possession in exchange.
Entire libraries and archives with files from all over Europa were looted and their files taken to Russia by the Soviet Trophy Brigades. The Russian State Military Archive (Rossiiskii Gosudarstvenni Voennyi Arkhiv- RGVA) still contains a large number of files of foreign origin, including papers relating to Jewish organisations.
Berlin’s Gemäldegalerie
Gemäldegalerie, Berlin
The Gemäldegalerie is an art museum in Berlin, Germany. It holds one of the world's leading collections of European art from the 13th to the 18th centuries. It is located on Kulturforum west of Potsdamer Platz. Its collection includes masterpieces from such artists as Albrecht Dürer, Lucas...
at Friedrichshain
Friedrichshain
Friedrichshain is a part of Berlin's borough of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, and like Kreuzberg across the river it has its own distinct character, with the result that the new double name is hardly ever used outside government administration. From its creation in 1920 until Berlin's 2001...
lost 441 major paintings, among them seven works by Peter Paul Rubens, three Caravaggio
Caravaggio
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was an Italian artist active in Rome, Naples, Malta, and Sicily between 1593 and 1610. His paintings, which combine a realistic observation of the human state, both physical and emotional, with a dramatic use of lighting, had a formative influence on the Baroque...
s and three Van Dycks. The looted artworks might still be in "secret depositories ... in Moscow and St Petersburg". Veteran BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
foreign correspondent, the late Charles Wheeler
Charles Wheeler (journalist)
Sir Charles Cornelius Wheeler CMG was a British journalist and broadcaster. Having joined the BBC in 1947, he became the corporation's longest serving foreign correspondent, serving in the role until his death...
, then Berlin correspondent of the BBC's German Service received a small painting as a wedding present in 1952 from an East German farmer, given it in return for some potatoes. The portrait of Eleonora of Toledo (1522–1562), the daughter of the Neapolitan viceroy and wife of the first Duke of Florence, Cosimo di Medici
Cosimo de' Medici
Còsimo di Giovanni degli Mèdici was the first of the Medici political dynasty, de facto rulers of Florence during much of the Italian Renaissance; also known as "Cosimo 'the Elder'" and "Cosimo Pater Patriae" .-Biography:Born in Florence, Cosimo inherited both his wealth and his expertise in...
I, he found from the Commission for Looted Art in Europe, had been looted from the Gemäldegalerie. The gallery had photographed the picture by Alessandro Allori
Alessandro Allori
Alessandro di Cristofano di Lorenzo del Bronzino Allori was an Italian portrait painter of the late Mannerist Florentine school....
(1535–1607) before the closing down and in 1939 putting its collection in secure storage areas, which Soviet troops broke into at the war’s end. Wheeler covered the process in It's My Story: Looted Art for BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
, contacting the Commission for Looted Art, the identification of the painting’s rightful owner in Germany and the hand-over in Berlin. On May 31, 2006, the commission, the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation
Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation
The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation , headquartered in Berlin, Germany, is one of the largest cultural institutions in the world. It was founded by a West German federal law passed on 25 July 1957, with the mission to acquire and protect the cultural legacy of the former state of Prussia...
, representing the Berlin state museums, announced the return of the painting.
The Eberswalde Gold Treasures and German Merovingian Art Treasures were taken from Berlin to Soviet Russia.
British troops and the Naval War Trophies Committee also looted artworks from Germany, including several pictures by marine artist Claus Bergen ("Wreath in the North Sea in Memory of the Battle of Jutland", "The Commander U-boat", "Admiral Hipper's Battle Cruiser at Jutland" and "The German Pocket Battleship Admiral Von Scheer Bombarding the Spanish Coast"), Carl Saltzmann ("German Fleet Manoeuvres on the High Seas") and Ehrhard (""Before the Hurricane at Apia Samoa and "During the Hurricane at Apia"). The pictures were looted from the Mürwik Naval Academy at Flensburg
Flensburg
Flensburg is an independent town in the north of the German state of Schleswig-Holstein. Flensburg is the centre of the region of Southern Schleswig...
, as documented by a 1965–66 Ministry of defense file in the UK National Archives. The trophies were sent to British museums, five remain in the National Maritime Museum
National Maritime Museum
The National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, England is the leading maritime museum of the United Kingdom and may be the largest museum of its kind in the world. The historic buildings forming part of the Maritime Greenwich World Heritage Site, it also incorporates the Royal Observatory, Greenwich,...
in London (NMM), one picture ("Before the Hurricane at Apia") was lent to HMS Calliope in 1959, lost, and formally written-off in 1979. The National Maritime Museum admitted in January 2007, that "the documentation at the NMM and the National Archives is not complete", according to spoliation guidelines, the pictures should be regarded as having been "wrongly taken".
Sistine Madonna
Sistine Madonna, also called La Madonna di San Sisto, is an oil painting by the Italian artist Raphael. Finished shortly before his death, ca. 1513–1514, as a commissioned altarpiece, it was the last of the painter's Madonnas and the last painting he completed with his own hands...
and Sleeping Venus, which had been "saved and restored" by the Soviets after the Battle of Berlin
Battle of Berlin
The Battle of Berlin, designated the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, was the final major offensive of the European Theatre of World War II....
. According to Irina Antonova
Irina Antonova
Irina Aleksandrovna Antonova has been Director of the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow since 1961, making her the oldest director of a major art museum in the world...
, "a cultural bureaucrat in the traditional Soviet style" and Director of the Pushkin Museum
Pushkin Museum
The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts is the largest museum of European art in Moscow, located in Volkhonka street, just opposite the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour....
, more than 1,500,000 items of cultural value (including the frieze reliefs of the Pergamon Altar
Pergamon Altar
The Pergamon Altar is a monumental construction built during the reign of King Eumenes II in the first half of the 2nd century BC on one of the terraces of the acropolis of the ancient city of Pergamon in Asia Minor....
and the Grünes Gewölbe
Grünes Gewölbe
The Grünes Gewölbe in Dresden is a unique historic museum that contains the largest collection of treasures in Europe. Founded by Augustus the Strong in 1723, it features a rich variety of exhibits from the Baroque to Classicism...
treasures) were restituted to German museums at the behest of the Soviet government in the 1950s and 1960s. "We have not received anything in return", Antonova has observed in 1999.
The reasons for the Soviet looting of Germany and the subsequent Russian attempts are revealed in an interview that Irina Antonova gave to the German Die Welt
Die Welt
Die Welt is a German national daily newspaper published by the Axel Springer AG company.It was founded in Hamburg in 1946 by the British occupying forces, aiming to provide a "quality newspaper" modelled on The Times...
newspaper, the interview specifically focuses on the Russian notion of looting, using the historical example of Napoleon as a direct reference for the Russian justification of the Plunder of Germany: "Three quarters of all the Italian art in the Louvre came to Paris with Napoleon. We all know this, yet the works remain in the Louvre. I know the place where Veronese's large painting used to hang in the monastery of Vicenza. Now it's in the Louvre where it will stay. It's the same with the Elgin Marbles in London. That's just the way it is."
At the 1998 conference Eizenstat was "impressed ... almost overwhelmed", when Boris Yeltsin
Boris Yeltsin
Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was the first President of the Russian Federation, serving from 1991 to 1999.Originally a supporter of Mikhail Gorbachev, Yeltsin emerged under the perestroika reforms as one of Gorbachev's most powerful political opponents. On 29 May 1990 he was elected the chairman of...
's government promised "to identify and return art that was looted by the Nazis and then plundered by Stalin's troops as 'reparations' for Germany's wartime assault." Alarmed by these negotiations, the State Duma
State Duma
The State Duma , common abbreviation: Госду́ма ) in the Russian Federation is the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia , the upper house being the Federation Council of Russia. The Duma headquarters is located in central Moscow, a few steps from Manege Square. Its members are referred to...
of the Russian Federation promulgated a law (15 April 1998), whereby "the cultural valuables translocated to the USSR after World War II" were declared national patrimony of the Russian Federation and each occasion of their alienation was to be sanctioned by the Russian parliament. The preamble to the law classifies the remaining valuables, such as Priam's Treasure
Priam's Treasure
Priam’s Treasure is a cache of gold and other artifacts discovered by classical archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann. Schliemann claimed the site to be that of ancient Troy, and assigned the artifacts to the Homeric king Priam. This assignment is now thought to be a result of Schliemann's zeal to...
, as a compensation for "the unprecedented nature of Germany's war crimes" and irreparable damage inflicted by the German invaders on Russian cultural heritage during the war.
Following the law adopted by the State Duma on 17 April 2002, the Hermitage Museum
Hermitage Museum
The State Hermitage is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia. One of the largest and oldest museums of the world, it was founded in 1764 by Catherine the Great and has been opened to the public since 1852. Its collections, of which only a small part is on permanent display,...
returned to Frankfurt an der Oder the looted medieval stained-glass windows of the Marienkirche, six of the 117 individual pieces however still remain missing. Andrei Vorobiev, the former Academic Secretary of the Museum confirmed in 2005 the assumption that they are still in Russia (in the Pushkin Museum.) According to the Hermitage, "As a gesture in return, the German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
company Wintershall
Wintershall
Wintershall AG is the largest crude oil and natural gas producer in Germany. The company is based in Kassel, Germany. Wintershall is a wholly owned subsidiary of BASF, based in Ludwigshafen. The name Wintershall is derived from the surname of the enterprise co-founder Carl Julius Winter and the...
paid for the restoration of a church destroyed during the Second World War, Novgorod's Church of the Assumption on Volotovoe Pole". In addition, the Hermitage did demand and receive a compensation of USD 400.000 for "restoring and exhibiting the windows".
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
after World War II from the German Prince of Anhalt
Anhalt
Anhalt was a sovereign county in Germany, located between the Harz Mountains and the river Elbe in Middle Germany. It now forms part of the state of Saxony-Anhalt.- Dukes of Anhalt :...
, who suffered under both the Nazis and Bolsheviks alike, before he was posthumously rehabilitated. In a so called "good will gesture" the collection was returned to the descendants of the Prince by the Ministry of Culture even though the Russian prosecutor originally refused the request of the children of the rehabilitated prince.
Lev Bezymenski, a Russian officer and translator, who became a controversial historian and professor at Moscow's military academy, died at June 26, 2007 at age 86 in Moscow. He was a military intelligence officer of the 1st Belorussian Front
1st Belorussian Front
The 1st Belorussian Front was a Front of the Soviet Army during World War II...
under Marshal Georgy Zhukov
Georgy Zhukov
Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov , was a Russian career officer in the Red Army who, in the course of World War II, played a pivotal role in leading the Red Army through much of Eastern Europe to liberate the Soviet Union and other nations from the Axis Powers' occupation...
, participated in the interrogation of German Generalfeldmarschall
Generalfeldmarschall
Field Marshal or Generalfeldmarschall in German, was a rank in the armies of several German states and the Holy Roman Empire; in the Austrian Empire, the rank Feldmarschall was used...
Friedrich Paulus
Friedrich Paulus
Friedrich Wilhelm Ernst Paulus was an officer in the German military from 1910 to 1945. He attained the rank of Generalfeldmarschall during World War II, and is best known for having commanded the Sixth Army's assault on Stalingrad during Operation Blue in 1942...
, and translated the message confirming Adolf Hitler's death for Stalin. After the Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...
captured Berlin in 1945 he investigated Adolf Hitler's death and headquarters. In his many articles and books (Bezymenski, L. Stalin and Hitler (2002), Bezymenski, L. (1968). The Death of Adolf Hitler: Unknown Documents from Soviet Archives. Harcourt Brace. ISBN 0-7181-0634-2) he failed to mention that he looted several containers filled with around 100 gramophone record
Gramophone record
A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...
s from the Reich Chancellery
Reich Chancellery
The Reich Chancellery was the traditional name of the office of the Chancellor of Germany in the period of the German Reich from 1871 to 1945...
, recordings performed by the best orchestras of Europe and Germany with the best soloists of the age. The collection stolen by Bezymenski, who himself was Jewish, included many Russian and Jewish artists. Bezymenski brought the looted collection of the Führer's favourite discs to Moscow, where he felt "guilty about his larceny and hid the records in an attic, where his daughter, Alexandra Besymenskaja, discovered them by accident in 1991". Bezymenski understood the political implications of his actions and "kept quiet about the records during his lifetime for fear that he would be accused of looting." The collection still remains in Russia.
In another high profile case Viktor Baldin, who served as a front-line soldier and Soviet army captain in World War II and later directed the Shusev
Alexey Shchusev
Alexey Viktorovich Shchusev ), 1873, Chişinău—24 May 1949, Moscow) was an acclaimed Russian and Soviet architect whose works may be regarded as a bridge connecting Revivalist architecture of Imperial Russia with Stalin's Empire Style....
State Scientific Research Museum of Architecture
Donskoy Monastery
Donskoy Monastery is a major monastery in Moscow, founded in 1591 in commemoration of Moscow's deliverance from an imminent threat of Khan Kazy-Girey’s invasion...
in Moscow, stole 362 drawings and two small paintings on May 29, 1945 from the Kunsthalle in Bremen
Kunsthalle Bremen
The Kunsthalle Bremen is an art museum in the Hanseatic City Bremen, Germany.The Kunsthalle was built in 1849 and enlarged in 1902 by architect Eduard Gildemeister....
, which the Russian Culture Minister Mikhail Shvydkoi estimates at USD 1.5 billion. From the entire collection of the Kunsthalle, more than 1,500 artworks are still missing, in 1991 and 1997 the Kunsthalle published printed catalogues of the works of art from the lost during the evacuation in the Second World War.
Baldin claims that he protected the collection of works from Corot
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot was a French landscape painter and printmaker in etching. Corot was the leading painter of the Barbizon school of France in the mid-nineteenth century...
, Delacroix
Eugène Delacroix
Ferdinand Victor Eugène Delacroix was a French Romantic artist regarded from the outset of his career as the leader of the French Romantic school...
, Degas, Dürer, Van Gogh, Goya, Manet
Manet
-MANET as an abbreviation:*MANET is a mobile ad hoc network, a self-configuring mobile wireless network.*MANET database or Molecular Ancestry Network, bioinformatics database-People with the surname Manet:*Édouard Manet, a 19th-century French painter....
, Raphael
Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino , better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur...
, Rembrandt, Rodin
Auguste Rodin
François-Auguste-René Rodin , known as Auguste Rodin , was a French sculptor. Although Rodin is generally considered the progenitor of modern sculpture, he did not set out to rebel against the past...
, Rubens
Rubens
Rubens is often used to refer to Peter Paul Rubens , the Flemish artist.Rubens may also refer to:- People :Family name* Paul Rubens Rubens is often used to refer to Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640), the Flemish artist.Rubens may also refer to:- People :Family name* Paul Rubens (composer) Rubens is...
, Toulouse-Lautrec, and Titian
Titian
Tiziano Vecelli or Tiziano Vecellio Tiziano Vecelli or Tiziano Vecellio Tiziano Vecelli or Tiziano Vecellio (c. 1488/1490 – 27 August 1576 better known as Titian was an Italian painter, the most important member of the 16th-century Venetian school. He was born in Pieve di Cadore, near...
after his engineers and sappers' unit from the 38. Soviet Army had requisitioned and plundered the storage place, the hunting lodge Karnzow Castle, at Kyritz
Kyritz
Kyritz is a town in the Ostprignitz-Ruppin district, in Brandenburg, Germany. It is situated 28 km west of Neuruppin and 28 km southeast of Pritzwalk.There are 9,900 inhabitants .-Overview:...
, north of Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
in Germany. Baldin traded personal items to keep the collection together and hid the artworks after the war at his home until he gave it to the Shusev State Scientific Research Museum of Architecture before the collection was hurriedly transferred to the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg in 1991 in a cover-up attempt (and where it was exhibited in 1993). Baldin tried for several decades to give the stolen art back to Germany, he even wrote to Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in 1973 and to many Soviet political and cultural officials including Mikhail Suslov
Mikhail Suslov
Mikhail Andreyevich Suslov was a Soviet statesman during the Cold War. He served as Second Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1965, and as unofficial Chief Ideologue of the Party until his death in 1982. Suslov was responsible for party democracy and the separation of power...
, as well as Raisa and Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...
– to no avail, until 1990, when it seemed that the art pieces could return to their rightful owner. According to Wolfgang Eichwede, an art expert and history professor at Bremen University, in a gesture of reconciliation 101 pieces, including Albrecht Duerers 1494 watercolor "View of a Rock Castle by a River", were returned in 2000, following the simultaneous return of two artifacts of the Amber Chamber
Amber Room
The Amber Room in the Catherine Palace of Tsarskoye Selo near Saint Petersburg is a complete chamber decoration of amber panels backed with gold leaf and mirrors...
, bought and financed by a German merchant from Bremen to speed their return to Russia. The history of the stolen paintings and the odyssey of partial return back to Bremen is featured in the 2007 book "Victor Baldin – The Man with the Suitcase/Victor Baldin – Der Mann mit dem Koffer".
The Russian Minister of Culture Mikhail Shvydkoy even confirmed in 2003 Russian General Prosecutor's Office orders concerning the resolution of the Hanse Supreme court deciding that the entire 364 remaining items are property of the Bremen Kunsthalle. The former culture minister Mikhail Shvydkoy supported the return of the looted art to Germany, but faced opposition from nationalist leaders, including Communist legislator and former Culture Minister Nikolai Gubenko
Nikolai Gubenko
Nikolai Nikolaevich Gubenko is a Soviet actor, film director and screenwriter. He appeared in twelve films between 1964 and 1977. He also directed eight films between 1970 and 1988. His film Wounded Game, was entered into the 1977 Cannes Film Festival...
. Nikolai Gubenko was already involved in the Russian attempt to hide the Baldin collection in 1991 when the collection was "hurriedly transferred to the assets of the Ministry of Culture" (led by Gubenko). The State Duma
Duma
A Duma is any of various representative assemblies in modern Russia and Russian history. The State Duma in the Russian Empire and Russian Federation corresponds to the lower house of the parliament. Simply it is a form of Russian governmental institution, that was formed during the reign of the...
, including Gubenko as a member of the Duma, on March 12, 2003 even passed a nonbinding resolution asking President Putin to prevent the Culture Ministry from returning to Germany the Baldin Collection, even though the artworks were clearly stolen by an individual and thus not covered by the Russian Trophy Art law. Culture Minister Mikhail Shvydkoy opposed these nationalistic attempts: "In all spheres, the war is over for us. We're already friendly with Germans, we marry them, we dream of traveling there and they here ... But for some reason, there's a terrible war going on for culture." Shvydkoy and the German Minister of Culture (Kulturstaatsministerin) Christina Weiss even signed an agreement, that 20 pieces of the Baldin ensemble will remain in Russia. Mikhail Shvydkoy has later received an official warning and reprimand and was threatened by deputy prosecutor Vladimir Kolsenikov with criminal charges if he would return the art collection to Germany.
Anatoly Vilkov, from the Russian ministry of culture and mass communications, stated that "Russia has no right to keep the Baldin collection. We did not receive this right through a gift, since by law the collection did not belong to the donor Baldin", but in 2005 Aleksandr Sergeyevich Sokolov
Aleksandr Sergeyevich Sokolov
Aleksandr Sergeyevich Sokolov is a Russian politician and former Minister of Culture and Mass Communication for then-President Vladimir Putin's government. He was nominated to the post by the then-Prime Minister, Mikhail Fradkov, and held it from 9 March 2004 to 12 May 2008.Sokolov was born on 8...
, Russia's minister of culture and mass communications, contradicted several statements and promises given before and opposed the return of the so-called Baldin collection to Germany.
According to an interview given by his wife Julia Siwakowa, it was Victor Baldin's last will that the looted art will be returned to the Kunsthalle: "The collection belongs to human mankind, not only Germany, but the collection was located at the Kunsthalle Bremen, and she must be returned to this place." While the Allied committees restored the art to its rightful owners as "fast as possible after the war, ... the Russians refused to" – until now the stolen artwork remains in Russia.
Looting of Iraq
Archaeological looting in Iraq
Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, archaeological looting has become a major problem. Though some sites, such as Ur and Nippur, are officially protected by US and Coalition forces, most are not...
after the American-led invasion, including but not limited to the National Museum of Iraq
National Museum of Iraq
The National Museum of Iraq is a museum located in Baghdad, Iraq. It contains precious relics from Mesopotamian civilization.-Foundation:...
. Following the looting by Iraqi nationals during the chaos of war, the British and American troops were accused of not preventing the pillaging of Iraq's heritage by local citizens. The liberation forces were involved in heavy battles with not enough troops to protect the National Museum and Library in Baghdad from local thieves. The troops were criticized by archeologists: "American officials came under sharp criticism from archaeologists and others for not securing the museum, a vast storehouse of artifacts from some of civilization's first cities."
After the U.S. troops entered Baghdad on April 9, 2003, at least 13,000 artifacts were stolen by Iraqi thieves during the looting, including many moved from other sites into the National Museum for safekeeping. U.S. American troops and tanks were stationed in that area but without orders to stop the looting "watched for several days before moving against the thieves." Sargent Jackson of the 1st Marine Battalion explained that "...our orders were to avoid engaging religious Muslims who were unarmed. So when groups of Imams demanded to remove religious items to prevent them from being defiled by the infidels, how were we supposed to know that they were thieves? Our captain didn't want to create an international incident by arresting religious leaders."
The Boston Globe writes: "Armies not of fighters but of looters, capitalizing on a security vacuum after war, have pillaged Babylon" and Donny George, the curator of Iraq's National Museum says about the art looting:
George's comments followed widespread reporting that 100 percent of the museum's 170,000 inventoried lots (about 501,000 pieces) had been removed by looters. In fact, about 95 percent of the museum's contents never left the museum. According to investigators of the thefts, about 2 percent of the museum pieces were stored elsewhere for safekeeping. Another 2 percent was stolen, in an apparent "inside job," just before U.S. troops arrived. And about 1 percent, or about 5,000 items, were taken by outside looters. Most of the looted items were tiny beads and amulets.
The horror of art looting in general is made clear by Hashem Hama Abdoulah, director of the museum of antiquities in Sulaymaniyah, in the Kurdish-controlled zone of northern Iraq.
Many other looted art objects end up in black markets with rich art collectors and art dealers, mostly the United States, Great Britain, Italy and Syria, in 2006 the Netherlands returned to Iraqi authorities three clay tablets that it believes had been stolen from the museum. One of the most valuable artifacts looted during the plunder of the National Museum of Iraq, a headless stone statue of the Sumerian king Entemena
Entemena
Entemena was a son of En-anna-tum I, and he reestablished Lagash as a power in Sumer. He defeated Illi of Umma, with the aid of Lugal-kinishe-dudu of Uruk, successor to Enshakushanna, who is in the king list.-Artifacts:...
of Lagash
Lagash
Lagash is located northwest of the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and east of Uruk, about east of the modern town of Ash Shatrah. Lagash was one of the oldest cities of the Ancient Near East...
, was recovered in the United States with the help of Hicham Aboutaam, an art dealer in New York. Thousands of smaller pieces have remained in Iraq or been returned by other countries, including Italy and the Netherlands.
Some of the artifacts have been recovered, custom officials in the United States intercepted at least 1,000 pieces, but many are still advertised at eBay or are available through known collectors and black markets. "U.S. troops, journalists and contractors returning from Iraq are among those who have been caught with forbidden souvenirs". The U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs maintains a list and image gallery of looted artworks from Iraq at the Iraq Cultural Property Image Collection.
Despite public announcements and temporary efforts by the Iraqi and American administration the situation in Iraqi Museums and archaeological sites did not improve. Donny George, the curator of Iraq's National Museum, the first person who raised his voice and alarmed the world about the looting in Iraq after the American invasion and publicly stated his opinion about the "ongoing failure of Iraqi leaders and the American military to protect the sites", has left the country and resigned in August 2006. Before he left he closed and sealed the museum and plugged the doors with concrete. In an article to Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
he even said that the stolen items should not be returned to Iraq under the given circumstances:"We believe this is not the right time now to have them back. Since we know all about them and are promised them back whenever we want them, it is better to keep them in these countries."
Looting of Italy
The looting of Italian art was not limited to Napoleon alone, Italian criminals have long been, and remain, extremely active in the field and Italy's battle to recover the antiquities it says were looted from the country and sold to museums and art collectors worldwide is still ongoing. The Italian government and the Art Squad of the CarabinieriCarabinieri
The Carabinieri is the national gendarmerie of Italy, policing both military and civilian populations, and is a branch of the armed forces.-Early history:...
, Italy's national police force, made special efforts to "[crack] the network of looters, smugglers, and dealers supplying American museums", collecting "mountains of evidence—thousands of antiquities, photographs, and documents—seized from looters and dealers in a series of dramatic raids". According to the BBC, Italian authorities have for several years insisted on the return of stolen or looted artworks from wealthy museums and collectors, particularly in America. Italy is demanding the return of the looted art and antiquities from many famous American institutions, including the Cleveland Museum of Art
Cleveland Museum of Art
The Cleveland Museum of Art is an art museum situated in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on Cleveland's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian art, the museum houses a diverse permanent collection of more than 43,000...
, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts
Minneapolis Institute of Arts
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts is a fine art museum located in the Whittier neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, on a campus that covers nearly 8 acres , formerly Morrison Park...
, the Princeton Museum of Art, the Toledo Museum of Art
Toledo Museum of Art
The Toledo Museum of Art is an internationally known art museum located in the Old West End neighborhood of Toledo, Ohio, United States. The museum was founded by Toledo glassmaker Edward Drummond Libbey in 1901, and moved to its present location, a Greek revival building designed by Edward B....
, and the private collection of the Leon Levy
Leon Levy
Leon Levy was, according to Forbes magazine, a "Wall Street investment genius and prolific philanthropist," who helped create both mutual funds and hedge funds. He co-founded the mutual fund manager Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. in 1959. There he started dozens of mutual funds that, at his death, had...
and his wife Shelby White.
In an Interview with Archaeology
Archaeology (magazine)
Archaeology is a bimonthly mainstream magazine about archaeology, published by the Archaeological Institute of America. Its focus is both for archaeologists and non-specialists alike. The magazine was launched in 1948, and is published six times a year....
, a publication of the Archaeological Institute of America
Archaeological Institute of America
The Archaeological Institute of America is a North American nonprofit organization devoted to the promotion of public interest in archaeology, and the preservation of archaeological sites. It has offices on the campus of Boston University and in New York City.The institute was founded in 1879,...
, investigative journalist Peter Watson
Peter Watson
Peter Watson was the archbishop of the Anglican Diocese of Melbourne. Watson was born in Sydney. He was ordained as a priest in Sydney in 1962 and consecrated as the Bishop of Parramatta in 1989 and became Bishop of South Sydney in 1993. In 2000 he was elected to succeed Keith Rayner as ...
writes in June 2006 that according to the Italian public prosecutor Paolo Ferri 100,000 tombs have been looted in Italy alone, representing a value of half a billion (US$). He estimates that the overall monetary value of looted art, including Greece, Turkey, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Cyprus, West Africa, Central America, Peru, and China, is at least four times the Italian figure. Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini authored The Medici Conspiracy, a book that uncovers the connection between looted art, the art and antiquities markets, auction houses, and museums.
In 2007 the Los Angeles J. Paul Getty Museum
J. Paul Getty Museum
The J. Paul Getty Museum, a program of the J. Paul Getty Trust, is an art museum. It has two locations, one at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, California, and one at the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California...
, at center of allegations by Italian officials about the pillaging of cultural artifacts from the country and other controversies, was forced to return 40 artifacts, including a 5th century BC statue of the goddess Aphrodite
Aphrodite
Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation.Her Roman equivalent is the goddess .Historically, her cult in Greece was imported from, or influenced by, the cult of Astarte in Phoenicia....
, which was looted from Morgantina
Morgantina
Morgantina is an archaeological site in east central Sicily, southern Italy. It is sixty kilometres from the coast of the Ionian Sea, in the province of Enna. The closest modern town is Aidone, two kilometres southwest of the site...
, an ancient Greek settlement in Sicily.
The Getty acquired the statue in 1988 for $18 million USD from an anonymous collector fully aware about the controversy focusing on the unclear provenance and origin. The Getty Museum resisted the requests of the Italian government for nearly two decades, only to admit later that "there might be 'problems'" attached to the acquisition." In 2006 Italian senior cultural official Giuseppe Proietti said: "The negotiations haven't made a single step forward", only after he suggested the Italian government "to take cultural sanctions against the Getty, suspending all cultural cooperation," did the J. Paul Getty Museum return the antiquities. According to the New York Times, the Getty Museum confirmed in May 2007, that the statue "most likely comes from Italy."
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...
in New York, which was forced to return a set of 16 silver pieces from the 3rd century BC, illegally excavated from Morgantina
Morgantina
Morgantina is an archaeological site in east central Sicily, southern Italy. It is sixty kilometres from the coast of the Ionian Sea, in the province of Enna. The closest modern town is Aidone, two kilometres southwest of the site...
, Italy. In 2006 the Metropolitan Museum of Art relinquished ownership of a 2,500-year-old Greek vase known as the Euphronios krater
Euphronios krater
The Euphronios krater is an ancient Greek terra cotta krater, a bowl used for mixing wine with water. Created around the year 515 BC, it is considered one of the finest Greek vase in existence artifacts and is the only complete example of the surviving 27 vases painted by the renowned Euphronios...
, a krater
Krater
A krater was a large vase used to mix wine and water in Ancient Greece.-Form and function:...
painted by Euphronios
Euphronios
Euphronios was an ancient Greek vase painter and potter, active in Athens in the late 6th and early 5th centuries BC. As part of the so-called "Pioneer Group,"...
, stolen from an Etruscan tomb and smuggled from Italy; 15 pieces of Sicilian silver and four ancient vessels in exchange for long-term loans of other prized antiquities. According to the New York Times, the case, "of its kind, perhaps second only to the dispute between Greece and Great Britain over the Elgin marbles", "became emblematic of the ethical questions surrounding the acquisition of ancient art by major museums".
The Museum of Fine Arts
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts, is one of the largest museums in the United States, attracting over one million visitors a year. It contains over 450,000 works of art, making it one of the most comprehensive collections in the Americas...
in Boston was forced to return 34 stolen artifacts – including Hellenistic silverware, Etruscan
Etruscan civilization
Etruscan civilization is the modern English name given to a civilization of ancient Italy in the area corresponding roughly to Tuscany. The ancient Romans called its creators the Tusci or Etrusci...
vases and Roman
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
statues. The aforementioned institutions have agreed to hand over the artworks in exchange for loans of other treasures. The former curator of the Getty Museum Marion True
Marion True
Marion True is the former curator of antiquities of the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, California.Born in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, she studied at New York University and has a PhD from Harvard...
and the art dealer Robert Hecht are currently on trial in Rome, Italy accuses them of buying and trafficking stolen and illicit artworks (including the Aphrodite statue). Evidence against both emerged in a 1995 raid of a Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
, Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
warehouse which contained many stolen artifacts.
The warehouses were registered to a Swiss company called Editions Services, which police traced to an Italian art dealer Giacomo Medici
Giacomo Medici (art dealer)
Giacomo Medici is an Italian art dealer convicted in 2004 of dealing in stolen ancient artifacts. His operation was thought to be "one of the largest and most sophisticated antiquities networks in the world, responsible for illegally digging up and spiriting away thousands of top-drawer pieces and...
. The Carabinieri stated that warehouses contained 10,000 artifacts worth 50 billion lire (about $35 million). In 1997 Giacomo Medici was arrested; his operation is believed to be "one of the largest and most sophisticated antiquities networks in the world, responsible for illegally digging up and spiriting away thousands of top-drawer pieces and passing them on to the most elite end of the international art market". Medici was sentenced in 2004 by a Rome court to ten years in prison and a fine of 10 million euro
Euro
The euro is the official currency of the eurozone: 17 of the 27 member states of the European Union. It is also the currency used by the Institutions of the European Union. The eurozone consists of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg,...
s, "the largest penalty ever meted out for antiquities crime in Italy".
In another unrelated case in 1999 the Getty Museum had to hand over three antiquities to Italy after determining they were stolen. The objects included a Greek red-figure kylix
Kylix (drinking cup)
A kylix is a type of wine-drinking glass with a broad relatively shallow body raised on a stem from a foot and usually with two horizontal handles disposed symmetrically...
from the 5th-century BC, signed by the painter Onesimos
Onesimos (vase painter)
Onesimos was an ancient Athenian vase painter who flourished between 505 and 480 BC. He specialized in decorating cups, mostly of Type B, which comprise virtually all known examples of his work....
and the potter Euphronios as potter, looted from the Etruscan
Etruscan civilization
Etruscan civilization is the modern English name given to a civilization of ancient Italy in the area corresponding roughly to Tuscany. The ancient Romans called its creators the Tusci or Etrusci...
site of Cerveteri
Cerveteri
Cerveteri is a town and comune of the northern Lazio, in the province of Rome. Originally known as Caere , it is famous for a number of Etruscan necropolis that include some of the best Etruscan tombs anywhere....
; a torso of the god Mithra
Mithra
Mithra is the Zoroastrian divinity of covenant and oath. In addition to being the divinity of contracts, Mithra is also a judicial figure, an all-seeing protector of Truth, and the guardian of cattle, the harvest and of The Waters....
from the 2nd-century AD, and the head of a youth by the Greek sculptor Polykleitos
Polykleitos
Polykleitos ; called the Elder, was a Greek sculptor in bronze of the fifth and the early 4th century BCE...
. According to the New York Times, the Getty Museum refused for several years to return the antiquities to their rightful owners.
Yet another case emerged in 2007, when Italy's art-theft investigation squad discovered a hidden cache of ancient marble carvings depicting early gladiators, the lower portion of a marble statue of a man in a toga and a piece of a column. Italian Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli used the case to underline the importance of these artifacts for Italy.
Looting of Poland
Second Partition of Poland
The 1793 Second Partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was the second of three partitions that ended the existence of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The second partition occurred in the aftermath of the War in Defense of the Constitution and the Targowica Confederation of 1792...
and Kościuszko Uprising
Kosciuszko Uprising
The Kościuszko Uprising was an uprising against Imperial Russia and the Kingdom of Prussia led by Tadeusz Kościuszko in Poland, Belarus and Lithuania in 1794...
in 1794 by Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n troops, on orders from Russian Czarina Catherine II, the stolen artworks were transported to St. Petersburg, and became part of the Russian Imperial Library which was founded one year later. Although some pieces were returned by the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
in 1921 and were burned during the Warsaw Uprising
Warsaw Uprising
The Warsaw Uprising was a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance Home Army , to liberate Warsaw from Nazi Germany. The rebellion was timed to coincide with the Soviet Union's Red Army approaching the eastern suburbs of the city and the retreat of German forces...
against German forces, other parts of the collection have still not been returned by Russia. Polish scientists have been allowed to access and study the objects.
Polish Crown Jewels
Polish Crown Jewels
The only surviving original piece of the Polish Crown Jewels from the time of the Piast dynasty is the ceremonial sword - Szczerbiec. It is currently on display along with other preserved royal items in the Wawel Royal Castle Museum, Kraków....
were removed by the Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
ns in 1795 after the Third Partition
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was a dualistic state of Poland and Lithuania ruled by a common monarch. It was the largest and one of the most populous countries of 16th- and 17th‑century Europe with some and a multi-ethnic population of 11 million at its peak in the early 17th century...
.
After collapse of the November Uprising
November Uprising
The November Uprising , Polish–Russian War 1830–31 also known as the Cadet Revolution, was an armed rebellion in the heartland of partitioned Poland against the Russian Empire. The uprising began on 29 November 1830 in Warsaw when the young Polish officers from the local Army of the Congress...
literary and art treasures were removed from Poland. Poland regained some of the artefacts after Treaty of Riga
Peace of Riga
The Peace of Riga, also known as the Treaty of Riga; was signed in Riga on 18 March 1921, between Poland, Soviet Russia and Soviet Ukraine. The treaty ended the Polish-Soviet War....
, comprising the furnishings of the Warsaw Castle
Royal Castle, Warsaw
The Royal Castle in Warsaw is a castle residency and was the official residence of the Polish monarchs. It is located in the Castle Square, at the entrance to the Warsaw Old Town. The personal offices of the king and the administrative offices of the Royal Court of Poland were located there from...
and the Wawel Castle
Wawel Castle
The Gothic Wawel Castle in Kraków in Poland was built at the behest of Casimir III the Great and consists of a number of structures situated around the central courtyard. In the 14th century it was rebuilt by Jogaila and Jadwiga of Poland. Their reign saw the addition of the tower called the Hen's...
.
During the Second World War Germany tried to completely destroy Poland and exterminate its population as well as culture. Countless art objects were looted, as Germany systematically carried out a plan of looting prepared even before the start of hostilities (see also Nazi plunder
Nazi plunder
Nazi plunder refers to art theft and other items stolen as a result of the organized looting of European countries during the time of the Third Reich by agents acting on behalf of the ruling Nazi Party of Germany. Plundering occurred from 1933 until the end of World War II, particularly by military...
). 25 museums and many other facilities were destroyed. The total cost of German theft and destruction of Polish art is estimated at 20 billion dollars, or an estimated 43% of Polish cultural heritage; over 516,000 individual art pieces were looted (including 2,800 paintings by European painters; 11,000 paintings by Polish painters; 1,400 sculptures, 75,000 manuscripts, 25,000 maps, 90,000 books including over 20,000 printed before 1800, and hundreds of thousands of other items of artistic and historical value). Soviet troops afterward contributed to the plunder as well.
Looting by the British empire
The transformation of theft and plunder as an incentive for troops to institutionalized, indiscriminate looting following military conflict can be observed in the wake of British conquest in Asia, Africa and India. The looting of artifacts for "both personal and institutional reasons" became "increasingly important in the process of ‘othering’ Oriental and African societies and was exemplified in the professionalism of exploration and the growth of ethnographic departments in museums, the new ‘temples of Empire’." Looting, not necessarily of art became a vital instrument for the projection of power and the British imperial desire to gather and provide information about the "exotic" cultures and primitive tribes.Looting by Napoleon
Napoleon's conquests in Europe were followed by a systematic attempt, later more tentatively echoed by Hitler, to take the finest works of art of conquered nations back to the LouvreLouvre
The Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
in Paris for a grand central Museum of all Europe. Napoleon boasted: Many works were returned after his fall, but many others were not, and remain in France. Many works confiscated from religious institutions under the French occupation now form the backbone of national museums: "Napoleon's art-loot depots became the foundation of Venice's Accademia
Accademia
The Accademia is a museum gallery of pre-19th century art in Venice, northern Italy. Situated on the south bank of the Grand Canal, within the sestiere of Dorsoduro, it gives its name to one of the three bridges across the canal, the Ponte dell'Accademia, and to the boat landing station for the...
, Milan's Brera galleries. His brother Louis
Napoleon III of France
Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte was the President of the French Second Republic and as Napoleon III, the ruler of the Second French Empire. He was the nephew and heir of Napoleon I, christened as Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte...
founded Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum; brother Joseph
Joseph Bonaparte
Joseph-Napoléon Bonaparte was the elder brother of Napoleon Bonaparte, who made him King of Naples and Sicily , and later King of Spain...
started Madrid's Prado
Museo del Prado
The Museo del Prado is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It features one of the world's finest collections of European art, from the 12th century to the early 19th century, based on the former Spanish Royal Collection, and unquestionably the best single collection of...
" (for the Spanish royal collection).
Napoleonic commander and Marechal Nicolas Jean de Dieu Soult
Nicolas Jean de Dieu Soult
Nicolas Jean-de-Dieu Soult, 1st Duke of Dalmatia , the Hand of Iron, was a French general and statesman, named Marshal of the Empire in 1804. He was one of only six officers in French history to receive the distinction of Marshal General of France...
stole in 1810 six large pictures painted by Murillo
Bartolomé Estéban Murillo
Bartolomé Esteban Murillo was a Spanish Baroque painter. Although he is best known for his religious works, Murillo also produced a considerable number of paintings of contemporary women and children...
in 1668 for the Hospital de la Caridad in Seville
Seville
Seville is the artistic, historic, cultural, and financial capital of southern Spain. It is the capital of the autonomous community of Andalusia and of the province of Seville. It is situated on the plain of the River Guadalquivir, with an average elevation of above sea level...
. One painting, The Return of the Prodigal Son, is now in the National Gallery of Art
National Gallery of Art
The National Gallery of Art and its Sculpture Garden is a national art museum, located on the National Mall between 3rd and 9th Streets at Constitution Avenue NW, in Washington, DC...
, Washington, a second looted painting, The Healing of the Paralytic, is in the National Gallery
National Gallery, London
The National Gallery is an art museum on Trafalgar Square, London, United Kingdom. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The gallery is an exempt charity, and a non-departmental public body of the Department for Culture, Media...
, in London, only two of the original paintings have returned to Seville.
Another French general looted several pictures, including four Claudes and Rembrandt's Descent from the Cross
Descent from the Cross
The Descent from the Cross , or Deposition of Christ, is the scene, as depicted in art, from the Gospels' accounts of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus taking Christ down from the cross after his crucifixion . In Byzantine art the topic became popular in the 9th century, and in the West from the...
, from the Landgrave
Landgrave
Landgrave was a title used in the Holy Roman Empire and later on by its former territories. The title refers to a count who had feudal duty directly to the Holy Roman Emperor...
of Hesse-Kassel
Hesse-Kassel
The Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel or Hesse-Cassel was a state in the Holy Roman Empire under Imperial immediacy that came into existence when the Landgraviate of Hesse was divided in 1567 upon the death of Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse. His eldest son William IV inherited the northern half and the...
in 1806. The stolen goods were later bought by the Empress Josephine
Joséphine de Beauharnais
Joséphine de Beauharnais was the first wife of Napoléon Bonaparte, and thus the first Empress of the French. Her first husband Alexandre de Beauharnais had been guillotined during the Reign of Terror, and she had been imprisoned in the Carmes prison until her release five days after Alexandre's...
and subsequently by the tsar. Since 1918, when the Bolshevik
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....
government signed a peace treaty with Germany and Austria have German negotiators demanded the return of the paintings. Russia refused to return the stolen goods, the pictures still remain in the Hermitage.
Looting by Nazi Germany
During World War II the Nazis set up special departments "for a limited time for the seizure and securing of objects of cultural value", especially in the Occupied Eastern Territories, including the BalticBaltic states
The term Baltic states refers to the Baltic territories which gained independence from the Russian Empire in the wake of World War I: primarily the contiguous trio of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania ; Finland also fell within the scope of the term after initially gaining independence in the 1920s.The...
States, Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
, Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
and Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
. The Russian imperial residences around St. Petersburg were thoroughly looted and deliberately blown up, so that their restoration is still under way. The Catherine Palace
Catherine Palace
The Catherine Palace was the Rococo summer residence of the Russian tsars, located in the town of Tsarskoye Selo , 25 km south-east of St. Petersburg, Russia.- History :...
and Peterhof
Peterhof Palace
The Peterhof Palace in Russian, so German is transliterated as "Петергoф" Petergof into Russian) for "Peter's Court") is actually a series of palaces and gardens located in Saint Petersburg, Russia, laid out on the orders of Peter the Great. These Palaces and gardens are sometimes referred as the...
were reduced to smoldering ruins; among the innumerable trophies was the world-famous Amber Room
Amber Room
The Amber Room in the Catherine Palace of Tsarskoye Selo near Saint Petersburg is a complete chamber decoration of amber panels backed with gold leaf and mirrors...
. Medieval churches of Novgorod and Pskov
Pskov
Pskov is an ancient city and the administrative center of Pskov Oblast, Russia, located in the northwest of Russia about east from the Estonian border, on the Velikaya River. Population: -Early history:...
, with their unique 12th-century frescoes, were systematically plundered and reduced to piles of rubble. Major museums around Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, including Yasnaya Polyana
Yasnaya Polyana
Yasnaya Polyana was the home of the writer Leo Tolstoy, where he was born, wrote War and Peace and Anna Karenina, and is buried. Tolstoy called Yasnaya Polyana his "inaccessible literary stronghold". It is located southwest of Tula, Russia and from Moscow.In 1921, the estate formally became his...
, Joseph-Volokolamsk Monastery
Joseph-Volokolamsk Monastery
Joseph Volokolamsk Monastery is a monastery for men, located 17 km northeast of Volokolamsk, Moscow Oblast. In the 15th and 16th century, it rivaled the Trinity as the most authoritative and wealthy monastery in Russia...
, and New Jerusalem
New Jerusalem Monastery
The New Jerusalem Monastery or Novoiyerusalimsky Monastery , also known as the Voskresensky Monastery, is a male monastery, located in the town of Istra in Moscow Oblast, Russia....
, faced a similar fate, with their architectural integrity irrevocably impaired.
The legal framework and the language of the instructions used by Germany resembles the Lieber Code, but in the Nuremberg Trial Proceedings the victorious Allied armies applied different standards and sentenced the Nazis involved as war criminals. The Article 6 of the Charter of the International Military Tribunal of Nuremberg, detailing the Jurisdiction and General Principles, declares the "plunder of public or private property" a war crime, while the Lieber Code and the actions of the Allied armies in the aftermath of World War Two allowed or tolerated the looting. The main objective of the looting is made clear by Dr. Muhlmann, responsible for the securing of all Polish art treasures: "I confirm that the art treasures ... would not have remained in Poland in case of a German victory, but they would have been used to complement German artistic property."
One inventory of 39 volumes featuring the looted art and antiques, prepared by the Nazis and discussed during the Nuremberg trials lists "21,903 Works of Art: 5,281 paintings, pastels, water colors, drawings; 684 miniatures, glass and enamel paintings, illuminated books and manuscripts; 583 sculptures, terra cottas, medallions, and plaques; 2,477 articles of furniture of art historical value; 583 textiles (tapestries, rugs, embroideries, Coptic textiles); 5,825 objects of decorative art (porcelains, bronzes, faience
Faience
Faience or faïence is the conventional name in English for fine tin-glazed pottery on a delicate pale buff earthenware body, originally associated with Faenza in northern Italy. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip...
, majolica
Maiolica
Maiolica is Italian tin-glazed pottery dating from the Renaissance. It is decorated in bright colours on a white background, frequently depicting historical and legendary scenes.-Name:...
, ceramics, jewelry, coins, art objects with precious stones); 1,286 East Asiatic art works (bronzes, sculpture, porcelain
Porcelain
Porcelain is a ceramic material made by heating raw materials, generally including clay in the form of kaolin, in a kiln to temperatures between and...
s, paintings, folding screen
Folding Screen
A folding screen , is a piece of free-standing furniture which consists of several frames or panels connected by hinges. It can be made in a variety of designs and with different kinds of materials. Screens have many practical and decorative uses...
s, weapons); 259 art works of antiquity (sculptures, bronzes, vases, jewelry, bowls, engraved gems, terracottas)."
When Allied forces bombed Germany's cities and historic institutions, Germany "began storing the artworks in salt mines and caves for protection from Allied bombing raids. These mines and caves offered the appropriate humidity and temperature conditions for artworks."
Looting by the Soviet Union
Polish Council of State
The Council of State of the Republic of Poland was introduced by the 1947 Small Constitution. It consisted of the President of the Republic of Poland, the Marshal and Vicemarshals of Constituent Sejm, President of the Supreme Chamber of Control and could consist of other members...
, Aleksander Zawadzki
Aleksander Zawadzki
Aleksander Zawadzki was a Polish Communist political figure and head of state of Poland from 1952 to 1964.A member of the Communist Youth Union, Zawadzki went into exile in the Soviet Union in 1931, after spending six years in prison for "subversive activities." He returned to Poland in 1939, just...
, worried that "raping and looting of the Soviet army would provoke a civil war". Soviet forces had engaged in plunder on Recovered Territories
Recovered Territories
Recovered or Regained Territories was an official term used by the People's Republic of Poland to describe those parts of pre-war Germany that became part of Poland after World War II...
which were to be transferred to Poland, stripping it of anything of value. A recently recovered masterwork is Gustave Courbet
Gustave Courbet
Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet was a French painter who led the Realist movement in 19th-century French painting. The Realist movement bridged the Romantic movement , with the Barbizon School and the Impressionists...
's Femme nue couchée
Femme nue couchée
Femme nue couchée is a 1862 painting by French Realist painter Gustave Courbet . It depicts a young dark-haired woman reclining on a couch, wearing only a pair of shoes and stockings. Behind her, partly drawn red curtains reveal an overcast sky seen through a closed window...
, looted in Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, Hungary, in 1945.
Looting by the Spanish Empire and others
The conquistadors looting the Latin and South Americas became one of the most commonly recognized plunders in the world.Roger Atwood writes in "Stealing History: Tomb Raiders, Smugglers, and the Looting of the Ancient World": "Mayan stonework became one of those things that good art museums in America just had to have, and looters in the jungles of southern Mexico and Guatemala worked overtime to meet the demand."
Looting in Mesoamerica has a long tradition and history, many graves are looted before the archaeologists could reach them, the artifacts are then sold to wealthy collectors in the United States, Japan or Europe. Guillermo Cock, a Lima-based archaeologist says about a recent find of Dozens of exquisitely preserved Inca mummies on the outskirts of Peru's capital city Lima
Lima
Lima is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, in the central part of the country, on a desert coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Together with the seaport of Callao, it forms a contiguous urban area known as the Lima...
: "The true problem is the looters", he said. "If we leave the cemetery it is going to be destroyed in a few weeks."
See also
- Antiquities tradeAntiquities tradeAntiquities trade is the exchange of antiquities and archaeological artifacts from around the world. This trade may be illicit or completely legal. The illicit antiquities trade involves non-scientific extraction that ignores the archaeological and anthropological context from which the artifacts...
- Art theftArt theftArt theft is usually for the purpose of resale or for ransom . Stolen art is sometimes used by criminals to secure loans.. One must realize that only a small percentage of stolen art is recovered. Estimates range from 5 to 10%. This means that little is known about the scope and characteristics of...
- InterpolInterpolInterpol, whose full name is the International Criminal Police Organization – INTERPOL, is an organization facilitating international police cooperation...
- List of artworks with contested provenance
- Royal CasketRoyal CasketThe Royal Casket was a memorial created in 1800 by Izabela Czartoryska. The large wooden casket contained 73 precious relics that had once belonged to Polish royalty...
- Polish Crown JewelsPolish Crown JewelsThe only surviving original piece of the Polish Crown Jewels from the time of the Piast dynasty is the ceremonial sword - Szczerbiec. It is currently on display along with other preserved royal items in the Wawel Royal Castle Museum, Kraków....
- War lootWar lootWar loot refers to goods, valuables and property obtained by force from their lawful owners via looting during or after warfare. These "spoils of war" differ from tributes or other payments extracted after the fact by a victorious nation in that their extraction is largely arbitrary and immediate,...
- List of missing treasure
Further reading
- Akinsha, Konstantin, et al. Beautiful Loot: The Soviet Plunder of Europe's Art Treasures. New York: Random House, 1995
- Alford, Kenneth D. The Spoils of World War II: The American Military's Role in the Stealing of Europe's Treasures. New York: Carol Publishing Group, 1994.
- Atwood, Roger. Stealing History: Tomb Raiders, Smugglers, and the Looting of the Ancient World. St. Martin's Press. November 18, 2004
- Carrington, Michael. 'Officers Gentlemen and Thieves: The Looting of Monasteries during the 1903/4 Younghusband Mission to Tibet' Modern Asian Studies, 37, 1, (2003) pp. 81–109. (Cambridge University Press).
- Chamberlin, E. R. Loot!: The Heritage of Plunder. New York: Facts on File, 1983.
- De Jaeger, Charles. The Linz File: Hitler's Plunder of Europe's Art. Exeter, England: Webb & Bower, 1981.
- Feliciano, Hector. The Lost Museum: The Nazi Conspiracy to Steal the World's Greatest Works of Art. New York: BasicBooks, 1997.
- Milbry Polk (Author) and Angela M.H. Schuster. The Looting of the Iraq Museum, Baghdad: The Lost Legacy of Ancient Mesopotamia. Harry N. Abrams, May 1, 2005