**Weekly Commentary - A weekly blog and podcast on art & architecture in the news**.
Hello and welcome!
The news we comment on today is about looted art and repatriation. The Victoria and Albert Museum in London, is in talks over returning looted Ethiopian treasures to their home country, where they were taken from more than 150 years ago.
This is one of the most recent news on the very controversial topic of looted art in periods of war, colonisation and archeological expedition: should looted art be returned to its country of origin and to its public and private owners?
Looting has always been a consequence of war since ancient times, thousands of years ago. For example, looting took place during the Napoleonic Wars in 1803-1815, the Nazi expansion in 1930’s and WWII, the Iraq War in 2003-2011, to name a few. A lot of European and US museums are filled with looted artefacts and treasures more and more they are the centre of harsh legal fights. One of the toughest of those legal battles is around the Parthenon Marbles, removed in 1801 from Athens and now in the British Museum.
What is new today is that countries and collectors who are reclaiming those artefacts back, are being listened and agreements restitution are taking place. However, a lot of legal issues seem unresolved: keeping something for a long period can give ownership, it is called “usucaption”. Does that apply? where does art property begin, what is private and public property in this field?
Another open question is when looted treasures have become listed and protected by the UNESCO: once those artworks are transferred back to their home countries, who ensures and pays for best preservation, restoration and storage?
Each case is different. The British Museums has already returned more than 2,000 objects looted during the Iraq War and helped with the reconstruction of the National Museum of Afghanistan in Kabul. The Victoria and Albert Museum is giving back the Ethiopian artefacts and this is part of a bigger research project by the museum on the provenance of its permanent collection, aiming to “decolonise” it, to share with the public a more honest conversation about history and colonisation.
This is all very interesting and I look forward to learning more.
This is Roby, from ART Tours with a Theme – ART wiT. I hope you enjoyed this podcast! This video is on FB and IGTV. The audio podcast is available on 7 platforms under “Art Tours with a Theme”: including Google Podcast and Spotify.
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