[MSN] Italy Digs in Its Heels in Artifacts Dispute With the Getty.

[Museum Security Network Mailinglist]

December 21, 2006
Italy Digs in Its Heels in Artifacts Dispute With the Getty 
By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO

ROME, Dec. 20 - Italy's culture minister warned on Wednesday that his
government would not budge from its demand that the J. Paul Getty Museum in
Los Angeles return all of the ancient artifacts in its collection that Italy
contends were illegally separated from their heritage. 

At a news conference here the minister, Francesco Rutelli, said the Italian
government was not satisfied with a proposal made by the Getty on Nov. 21 to
return 26 of 46 contested objects to Italy. 

"We cannot understand why they're being so obstinate," he said. "All 46
pieces belong to Italy, period." 

Negotiations between the museum and the Italian Culture Ministry broke down
in November after the Getty flatly refused to negotiate the return of a
fourth-century B.C. bronze statue of a heroic youth, one of the museum's
most prized possessions. 

The Getty sent a 20-page file to the Italian Culture Ministry outlining the
museum's argument that its ownership of the statue, found in international
waters in 1964 and purchased by the museum in 1977, "is not subject to
challenge."

Mr. Rutelli said the Italian state attorney's office reviewed the Getty's
file and rejected its conclusions. Reading from a four-page rebuttal drawn
up by the legal office, the minister said there was incontrovertible
evidence that the piece had passed through Italy and that its claims should
therefore prevail. 

In response to Mr. Rutelli's remarks the museum's parent, the J. Paul Getty
Trust, released a statement on Wednesday saying that the bronze "rightfully
belongs to the Getty."

Getty officials are "saddened that efforts to resolve our differences have
been stalled by a 40-year-old claim for a Greek statue found in
international waters," the statement said. The trust added that it
"continued to look forward to resolving any outstanding issues." 

The squabble over the bronze has overshadowed Italy's claims to the other 19
objects that the Getty refuses to return, the minister added. Reporters at
the news conference each received a dossier of photographs and other
documentation involving 10 of those objects, which were used as evidence to
convict an antiquities dealer, Giacomo Medici, of trafficking in looted
antiquities in 2004. 

Italian prosecutors are also drawing on the evidence to pursue their case
against the Getty's former curator of antiquities, Marion True, who is on
trial here on charges of conspiring to deal in looted antiquities. Several
works listed in the dossier distributed at the news conference belonged to a
300-piece trove of artifacts acquired by the museum in 1996 from the
collectors Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman. 

In its campaign to reclaim archaeological artifacts that it said were
clandestinely dug up and spirited away to foreign museums and private
collections, Italy has negotiated accords with the Metropolitan Museum of
Art in New York and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In exchange for the
return of contested objects, Italy has arranged long-term loans of other
items to both institutions, and negotiations are under way with other
museums. 

Mr. Rutelli praised the Getty for its recent formal move to tighten its
acquisitions policy and screen out items whose history cannot be documented.


But he said that the stalled negotiations ran counter to those new
standards. "How can they not return works that were obviously looted?" he
asked. He added that the ministry would "evaluate the initiatives" it could
take against the Getty if the museum refused to yield on the artifacts.

"They either give the pieces back or they don't, but this circus can't go on
for much longer," Mr. Rutelli said. 

http://www.nytimes.com/