ARCAblog

From Explosion to Recovery: Authorities Set Press Conference on Recovered Dacian Gold Stolen from the Drents Museum

2026-04-02T11:27:00.029+02:00

After fourteen months, Drents Museum and the Public Prosecution Service (OM) held a press conference this afternoon at 2:00 pm to formally announce the recovery of part of the Romanian treasures stolen from the Drents Museum in Assen overnight on 25 January 2025.

The golden helmet of Coțofenești, from the 5th century BCE.
This masterpiece of Geto-Dacian craftsmanship was discovered
by children after a heavy rainstorm in 1927.
Image Credit: Vibeke Berens

Three gold spirals dating from the 1st century BCE - 1st century CE.
They were originally found at Sarmizegetusa Regia,
one of the six Dacian fortification systems
on the UNESCO Heritage List.
Image Credit: Vibeke Berens

The theft, which shocked both the Netherlands and Romania, targeted objects on loan from the National History Museum of Romania in Bucharest. These works held profound national and symbolic significance, most notably the famed 2,500-year-old golden Helmet of Coțofenești, widely regarded as one of Romania’s most important cultural treasure. Their disappearance triggered widespread concern about museum security, international lending practices, and the vulnerability and commodification of gold and jewellery objects housed in museum collections which have increasingly become the target of thieves.

Although arrests were made early in the multinational Eurojust-coordinated investigation, the artefacts remained missing for months, ultimately resulting in the Netherlands paying out approximately €5.7 million in insurance compensation for the loss of the Dacian artefacts last September.

Corien Fahner, the head public prosecutor at the OM Noord-Nederland, announced that the recovery of the Helmet of Coțofenești and two of the three stolen gold bangles. Their return, on April 1st, follows months of investigation into the violent heist that shattered windows and caused damage to the museum buildings and which resulted in the arrest of three alleged accomplices from Heerhugowaard: Douglas Chesley Wendersteyt, Bernhard Zeeman and an individual only identified as "Jan B., all of whom have been charged for their alleged roles in having used explosives to breach the museum in order to execute the gold theft.

Notably, news of this recovery came just twelve days before substantive hearings in the defendants' criminal case were scheduled to begin on 14 April in Assen, with a fourth suspect scheduled to appear before a police judge in early May. David van Weel, Minister of Justice and Security in the Netherlands, has stated that the Romanian helmet and two of the gold spirals were recovered through plea deals made with the suspects, apparently in advance of their upcoming court appearance. Fahner, did not elaborate on what deals the OM made with the three suspects, indicating only that the OM will explain that during their trial.

Further details regarding the condition of the recovered objects, reveal that the helmet has some damages to areas restored previously but which are repairable. The circumstances of their recovery and the motivations for the theft are expected to be clarified at a later date. For both Dutch and Romanian authorities, as well as the director of the Drents Museum, Robert van Langh, these recoveries represent not only a significant investigative success, but also an important act of cultural restitution, restoring objects that carry deep historical and national meaning.

It's worth noting that the insurance amount paid out by the Netherlands last year represents the gold objects' insurance allocation amount and not the actual value of the historic items. Now that the gold has apparently been recovered, and assuming the objects are in good condition, the insurance paid out by the Netherlands should be reimbursed as part of a negotiated transfer of ownership agreement.

By Lynda Albertson

The Long Game: Why Organised Crime Holds, Not Sells, What It Steals

2026-03-31T19:14:00.018+02:00

When the news of the €11 million museum theft at the Fondazione Magnani Rocca in Traversetolo broke last Sunday, the incident was already six days old. Shortly after 2:00 am, on Monday, March 23, 2026, at least four masked accomplices entered the museum grounds having tampered with barrier rods which were part of a metal gate located along the periphery of the museum's manicured 12-hectare English-style garden to the North and East of the car park. From there it was a straight walk up the museum's pebbled path to reach the rear of Villa Magnani, also known as Villa dei Capolavori or "Villa of Masterpieces" where they broke in through an entrance door.

Modern museums design security around deterrence, delay, and response, layered measures which include access control, alarms, CCTV, and rapid police coordination. All of which are intended to shorten the time between intrusion and intervention. These thieves seemed to know this and set to work quickly.

Once inside, they quickly climbed the villa's sumptuous staircase, turned left down the hall and made their way into the small gallery on the left, the Sala Cézanne, which housed one oil and five watercolours, completed by the artist. Selecting one, the thieves removed it from its hook on the wall.

Paul Cézanne's Tasse et plat de cerises c. 1890

is one of the painter's rare workds in Italy

Medium: Watercolour paint, and pencil on paper

38cm x 49 cm

On that same floor, their second target was the Sala Impressionisti, which contains works by French masters who are quite rare in permanent Italian museum collections.

There the thieves selected two small, high-value paintings:

and Henri Matisse's Odalisque sur la terrasse 1922

Pierre-Auguste Renoir's Les Poissons, 1917

Medium: Oil on Canvas

40 x 51.5 cm

Worth an estimated at €9 million.

Some news report say that the thieves left behind a second painting by Renoir, the artist's Paysage de Cagnes as the team made their getaway in a 3 minute dash. Other document that it was left in place within arm’s reach of the two other wors taken from the Impressionist gallery, along with a canvas from the Pourville Cliffs series by Claude Monet and post-war paintings by Hans Hartung, Jean Fautrier, Wols and Nicolas de Staël.

Perhaps the other artworks were too big? Too many to carry, or time was running out. One thing is certain, the strike team walked through one gallery to get to the other, making their choice of artworks seem intentional: an operational calculus versus indiscriminate removal. Pre-selected, portable, and high-value targets, each apparently chosen over other works in the collection.

One possible motive behind high-value art thefts is their utility within organised crime as instruments of negotiation rather than objects of aesthetic or commercial interest. Works of art can function as portable leverage, stolen not for their sale's value, they are too recognisable, but for strategic use at some later date as a bargaining tool with judicial authorities.

In this context, highly recognisable paintings stolen from a museum become a form of currency within the criminal justice system, where cooperation, restitution, or intelligence can be perceived as potentially useful bartering tools, relinquished in exchange for reduced sentences or more favourable detention conditions. The cases of cocaine traffickers Flor Bressers and Raffaele Imperiale illustrate how artworks may be retained by organised crime actors for years before resurfacing (or not resurfacing) as part of broader negotiations, underscoring their strategic value which goes beyond their multi-million dollar price tags.

In Imperiale’s case, his possession of two paintings, View of the Sea at Scheveningen, 1882 and Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church in Nuenen 1884 - 1885, became a bargaining asset during the fugitive's cooperation with Italian authorities. When speaking in relation to the stolen paintings, Imperiale indicated that he had purchased (without explaining from whom) "some goods", not simply the two Van Goghs, paying five instalments of one million euros each for a total of €10 million for both paintings.

Similarly, Belgian drug dealer Bressers, is believed to have used the chat handle Bongoking to discuss the recently filched 17th-century painting, bragging about negotiating a lower purchase price.

In selected texts released to the public Bongoking writes:

“I recently bought a Frans Hals, 2 laughing boys,” “Paid dearly, brother… Asked for 750, settled for 550.”

Authorities believe this figure represents €550,000,

Both cases illustrate how the theft, concealment, and circulation of the high-profile stolen painting can be of interest to and circulate within criminal networks before resurfacing in judicial contexts.

These examples suggest that, for organised crime actors, the true value of stolen art may lie not in its liquidity, but in its capacity to be converted into legal advantage. In this sense, the thefts of paintings can serve a dual function: both as a criminal enterprise and as a long-term hedge when justice comes knocking.

By: Lynda Albertson

When “Financial Advice” Isn’t About Finance: Art Market Ambiguity and the Epstein–Black Relationship

2026-03-24T10:27:00.001+01:00

Knowing that ARCA has been exploring the thousands of documents in the Epstein files, provenance researcher Saida Hasanagic pointed us to a recent investigative article by The New York Times that has shed an interesting spotlight on the financial relationship between Jeffrey Epstein and Leon Black, revealing a complex and nuanced system the was symbiotically useful to both men. According to the analysis of released documents, Black is said to have paid Epstein roughly $170 million over several years for what was described as tax and estate planning advice, a figure exorbitantly higher than even a high net worth individual should have paid.

Yet, Epstein’s role as we now know extended well beyond conventional financial consultancy. He acted as an intermediary, structuring and routing payments to multiple women who were part of Black's constellation, in some cases using trusts or classifying transfers as “gifts,” mechanisms that could reduce transparency and alter tax exposure both to Black and the individuals the funds were routed to. What emerged was not simply a story of wealth management, but of systems designed to obscure. The use of intermediaries, layered financial vehicles, and vague professional designations created distance between payer, recipient, purpose and the receiver. In this architecture, language becomes a tool of concealment as much as the money itself.

Without identifying any of the individuals referenced in the New York Times reporting, or others appearing in the Epstein files, it is notable that several of the occupations attributed to females on the Epstein–Black payroll align with roles commonly found in the art market. Like many of the attributes of the art world, such designations offer a convenient layer of ambiguity, allowing both the nature of the services provided and the origin of the funds to remain obscure.

Describing oneself as “an independent professional in the arts” or an “art advisor” can function as a broad and opaque cover. In this respect, it echoes Epstein’s own characterization of himself as a conventional wealth and tax advisor, particularly for ultra-high-net-worth clients. All are titles which suggest conventional consultancies while masking having been involved in activities with far wider implications.

For those working in art crime and cultural property protection, this should feel uncomfortably familiar. The art market has long operated with a tolerance for opacity. Titles are fluid, transactions are often private, and documentation can be minimal or selectively constructed. Provenance gaps, vague ownership histories, and intermediated sales structures are not anomalies, but features embedded in the system.

The Epstein–Black case does not implicate the art market directly in the underlying conduct, but it does highlight how it could be harnessed. It demonstrates how easily loosely defined professional roles and opaque financial pathways can be used to blur transactional accountability. In both finance and the art world, legitimacy is often conveyed through language rather than evidence.

This is precisely why calls for greater transparency in the art market are not merely academic. When professional identities and transaction structures are sufficiently elastic, they can be repurposed to shield activities that would not withstand scrutiny in more regulated environments. Titles of "expert" alone, whether on paper, in catalogues, or on platforms like LinkedIn, are too often accepted at face value, yet they may reveal very little about the individual's actual expertise, responsibilities, or accountability. In a field where language so often substitutes for verification, the distinction between description and substantiation can be difficult to discern. The risk, therefore, is not only financial misconduct, but the quiet normalization of ambiguity itself.

If there is a lesson to be drawn, it is this: opacity is not neutral. It is an enabling condition. And when it comes to vague claims of expertise in the art market and little or no traceable footprint of experience in this discipline, in might be wise to consider hiring your art market expert the old-fashioned way, through serious vetting and not merely vague assumptions.

By Lynda Albertson

Never underestimate the power of reading new books to determine the outcomes of antiquities trafficking mysteries

2026-03-12T10:57:00.008+01:00

To bring attention to looting and plunder, the US nonprofit The Antiquities Coalition released a PDF "Top Ten Most Wanted" series highlighting a group of some "of the most significant looted, stolen, and missing artifacts from around the world." Their initiative aimed to spotlight the global crisis of cultural racketeering and to enlist the public’s help in locating and recovering objects that represent irreplaceable elements of humanity’s shared heritage.

One of the artefacts highlighted by the AC was this 3rd century CE alabaster statue base, found during an excavation conducted by an archaeological mission carried out by the American Foundation for the Study of Humans (AFSM) and the national team of the General Authority for Antiquities and Museums (GOAM). Logged as MB 2005 I-50, and later known as FB-Maḥram Bilqīs 2, this artefact was stolen sometime after from the Temple of Awwam, known locally as al-Mahram Bilqîs (Temple of Bilqls), on the outskirts of the ancient city of Ma'rib in Yemen. According to legend, Marib was the capital of the Sabaean kingdom, ruled by the biblical Queen of Sheba.

Fortunately for us, at some point after its discovery, the statue base it was measured and photographed by scholars and it was this photo which was used for the "Wanted" poster, emphasising the cultural losses to Yemen which have occurred before and turning its present conflict and stating the object's last known location was "at auction in Paris France".

I then began scrolling through pages and pages of South Arabian artefacts sold in the French capital by problematic individuals working the Paris market, during and after that date range listed on the "Wanted" poster. With time, I was able to find a matching photo of the alabaster base, as Lot 297 in the 1 December 2011 auction catalogue of Pierre Bergé & Associés, where the auction house when to great lengths to transcribe the twenty-six lines of the artefact's Sabaean inscription, a dedicatory text giving thanks and offering a bronze statue to the god Almaqah for the success of a punitive expedition against Abyssinian incursions during the reign of Lahay'athat Yarkham, King of Saba and Dhû Raydân, dated to around 230 to 240 CE. Unfortunately, the auction catalogue offered zero in the way of confirmable provenance information.

Knowing the sale had long past, I was left me with little more than what I knew from the original "Wanted" poster, but at least I had the Paris sales point. At a semi-dead end, I filed the information on the object away among my many where-has-it-gone-now files, hoping that one day a subsequent consignment might surface before the piece could be sold again.

Then, while reading a newly released book published in January by French art journalist Vincent Noce, titled L'or pillé des pharaons, I encountered an intriguing passage. Noce describes a network of indicted and unindicted individuals involved in circulating illicit antiquities through France and beyond. In the course of that discussion, he referenced a statue base that matched the object from the Antiquities Coalition’s poster.

Le plus notable est un socle de statue, catalogué comme provenant d’une « collection particulière », adjugé 44 000 € le 1er décembre 2011 à une galerie parisienne portant le nom de la déesse mère Cybèle. Comportant des inscriptions du royaume légendaire de Saba, il aurait été volé en 2005 dans les découvertes d’un chantier de fouilles mené par une mission américaine au temple d’Awam, dans la province yéménite de Marib. Apprenant que cet ouvrage était objet de l’enquête, le galeriste, Jean-Pierre Montesino, l’a remis à la police en remboursant son client. Il n’a jamais pu se faire dédommager par la maison Pierre Bergé, plus de dix ans étant passés depuis l’adjudication. Quand il voulut se retourner contre le vendeur, il s’aperçut que le nom figurant au bordereau de vente était en fait celui du transporteur.

Ce galeriste n’avait décidément pas de chance avec la société de ventes PBA...

According to Noce, this missing South Arabian artefact from Yemen had been purchased for €44,000 by the Parisian Galerie Cybèle. Upon learning that the piece was the subject of a criminal investigation, the gallery's owner, Jean-Pierre Montesino, handed the piece over to the French police and reimbursed his client.

Montesino, however, was unable to recover his losses. More than ten years had passed since the original auction, placing the transaction beyond the period in which he could seek compensation from Pierre Bergé & Associés. When he attempted to pursue the seller listed on the sales documentation, he discovered that the name recorded on the invoice belonged not to the consignor but to the transport company that had handled the shipment.

It is a detail that speaks volumes. The statue base had been plucked from its archaeological find spot in Yemen, a site where in 2007 a suicide bomber drove into a convoy of Spanish tourists killing seven Spaniards and two Yemenis less than two weeks after the United States issued a terrorism warning about the area. It was then smuggled out of Yemen making its first public appearance at the Paris auction house, through the hands of at least one anonymous intermediary whose identity was deliberately obscured, and into the collection of a dealer assumably unaware of the object's origins and no legal recourse once he did.

Montesino lost his money and at least publicly, the original vendor has never identified. And this fragment of Yemen's ancient civilisation, wrenched from its archaeological context more than a decade ago, now sits in a French police evidence room, waiting for a repatriation that cannot undo the knowledge lost the moment a thief first touched the piece in Awwam.

In December 2025, the General Authority for Antiquities and Museums condemned the systematic destruction of the Bilqis Temple (Awam Temple) in Marib Governorate by the public and antiquities thieves. One of many pieces stolen from that location, this episode highlights what is being lost forever due to the civil war and the subsequent humanitarian crisis in the region. It also serves as a reminder that the global antiquities trade remains far from clean, and continues to provide pathways through which vulnerable conflict antiquities can be removed, circulated, and legitimized long after the damage has been done.

By: Lynda Albertson

Meet Our Alumni: ARCA PG Cert Spotlight Series: Saida Hasanagic, art historian and provenance researcher

2026-03-10T08:02:00.008+01:00

What motivated you to enroll in ARCA’s Postgraduate Program?

My undergraduate degrees are in History of Art and International Relations while my graduate degree is in Art Business. However, my life took a slightly different turn and I did not pursue a career in my chosen fields of study. After 11 years in high-end sales and logistics, I decided that my life would not be complete if I do not pursue my initial passion of combining History of Art, International Relations and Art Market Studies. I just had to figure out how to do it.

I got in touch with the late Charley Hill, the former Scotland Yard Art and Antiques Unit undercover officer, then an art detective as well as specialist advisor and mentor on my graduate degree, MA Art Business at Sotheby’s Institute of Art in London. Charley was delighted to help, offering his inimitable advice and support. He urged me to get in touch with all the contacts I made during my MA studies and reassured me that not all is lost despite the long hiatus but that it would be hard work.

It was a chance encounter at the 2014 Cultural Heritage Conference at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London where I noticed that a person sitting next to me was Richard “Dick” Ellis, the founder of the Scotland Yard Art and Antiques Unit, then a private art investigator and a UK government advisor as well as an instructor on the ARCA Postgraduate Program. Dick was one of the “primary sources” I contacted on Charley’s recommendation while investigating the fate of stolen masterpieces from public collections in the United Kingdom for my MA dissertation. We chatted and commented on the conference presentations, and I reminded Dick how helpful and insightful the interview he gave me was in 2001. Dick suggested that we meet for lunch in the following few weeks. He told me about the ARCA Postgraduate Program urging me to consider it as it was, and still is, the unique program that could help me “refresh” my expertise and professional network in order to get back into the fray. As they say, the rest is history.

Can you describe a moment in the program that had a lasting impact on you—personally or professionally?

The visit to the necropolis of Banditaccia at Cerveteri at the beginning of the program had a lasting impact on me because I realised that I had made a good decision in terms of my future career. The study trip was led by Stefano Alessandrini, an ARCA instructor as well as head of Italy's Archaeological Group and an adviser to the Ministry of Culture and the Advocate General of Italy on the recovery of looted antiquities. Stefano’s passion for the Etruscan civilisation and unequalled encyclopaedic knowledge of archaeology was generously shared with us. I realised that this niche field is not just a potential career option, it is a calling which embodies passion and purpose.

Equally, the course Provenance Research Methodology – Theory and Practice taught by Marc Masurovsky, an economic plunder historian and co-founder of Holocaust Art Restitution Project, was instrumental in shaping my current career path where I realised that my academic background would be a perfect fit to the multidisciplinary approach in provenance research that Marc is adamant about. This is where I honed my interest in the intersection of my chosen fields of study, that is the ethical and legal treatment of cultural objects across borders (“space and time!”) as a reflection of social, economic and political changes under the motto “give me an object and I will tell you its story.” Most importantly, I was finally aligned with my personal experiences of war, loss, plunder, cultural destruction, and this was a chance to channel it positively.

What was your favourite course or topic, and why did it stand out?

It would be difficult to isolate one favourite course or topic! The courses that had the most impact on me professionally and personally are Provenance Research Theory and Practice taught by Marc Masurovsky; Criminology taught by Edgar Tijhuis (and Marc Balcells); Museum Security taught by the late Dick Drent (now taught by Ibrahim Bulut), and last but not least Fine Art Policing taught by Dick Ellis. Each course was instrumental in encouraging us to think analytically and outside the box as well as including details of case studies that have not yet been published.

The Provenance Research course was formative because it has geared my career path to what it is now while reiterating the importance of history in order to understand the present issues – history indeed is our greatest teacher! The Criminology course shed light to why certain individuals commit recidivist cultural crimes, what drives them and builds networks around them. The Museum Security course deepened my comprehension of the efforts and challenges that cultural institutions face as custodians of our heritage. The Art Policing course illuminated the challenges of the intersection of public and private policing as well as their respective recovery efforts. Having these courses taught by both practitioners and academics enabled me to learn first-hand from instructors involved in the discussed cases while being encouraged to ask questions deepened my understanding of each topic and case study.

How did the international nature of the program influence your learning experience?

I have been based in London since 1995 and I am enamoured of the cultural melting pot that this great city represents. The international nature of the ARCA program was a deal breaker for me especially considering that after fleeing Bosnia and Herzegovina during the 1990s war, I lived in Tunisia, Libya, and Malta, As an undergraduate student, I attended study abroad programs that took me to Cuba, China and Hong Kong as well as Russia. In the context of ARCA, the ability to learn directly from our American, Italian, Iraqi, Syrian and Spanish peers, as well as our, American, British, Dutch and Italian instructors, to name but a few, and get their own perspectives on some of the pertinent cultural issues and jurisdictional variations is priceless and unparalleled. Not to mention the fun get-togethers where we shared our regional culinary delicacies and humour while learning about our national and personal histories even more.

Did the program change or shape your career path? If so, how?

Absolutely! The program has changed my career path, and my life, significantly and goes down as one of the most formative experiences. I am convinced that I would not have been able to make a career change without it. On the suggestion of Lynda Albertson, ARCA’s CEO, I attended the 2017 Art Crime Conference before committing to the full program. I met numerous professionals and started collaborating with some of them. It was obvious that the faculty, the student body as well as the annual conference attendees I met at ARCA represent a close-knit professional community where I made useful contacts and felt welcome even as a novice.

After the completion of the program in 2018, my professional connections expanded and resulted in fantastic international projects, both pro-bono and paid work. I strongly believe that I would not be where I am now, working alongside some of the greatest and most passionate professionals in the world who have also become lifelong friends.

My ARCA dissertation, under the insistence as well as unrivalled support and patience of Dick Ellis to “produce something original”, allowed me to rediscover my own personal and national history by researching the art plunder and restitution during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This effort was not in vain because I gained invaluable knowledge and developed important professional networks in the region. The edited and updated version of this topic was published under the encouragement of Professor Saskia Hufnagel as “Recovery and Restitution of Plundered Cultural Property in Bosnia and Herzegovina” In M.D.Fabiani, K. Burmon, & S. Hufnagel (Eds), Cultural Property Crime and the Law: Legal Approaches to Protection, Repatriation, and Countering Illicit Trade, by Routledge in May 2024.

It is thanks to the ARCA program that I was hired by Marc Masurovsky to work on the Pilot Project – The Fate of the AdolpheSchloss Collection in 2020 and 2021. Together with Marc and our colleague Claudia Hofstee, I have continued to work on the Schloss Collection as a labour of love after the end of the project. These endeavours have led to becoming a Board Director at Holocaust Art Restitution Project and working with The Ciric LawFirm, PLLC in New York City. When I think of ARCA’s long-term impact on my life, Hegel’s famous quote comes to mind: “Nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion.”

What was it like to live and study in Amelia, Italy?

I have been visiting Italy for a very long time and it has always felt like home because I spent my childhood on the other side of the Adriatic coast and my early adulthood on the other side of the Mediterranean in countries with strong Italian influence. Culturally, I have always felt a close affinity to the Italian way of life so La Dolce Vita was much welcome. Amelia has many charms – you become local in no time due to its size; it is rural and picturesque; you can enjoy some of best fresh produce; it is quaint and steeped in history, and the locals are friendly and welcoming. The food is just superb!

One has to appreciate Amelia’s size and its proximity to other cities, such as Orvieto or the metropolis of Rome. In Amelia, one can just roll down or up Via della Repubblica and get to class in 5-20 minutes, depending where one’s lodgings are situated. It wins on every level especially if one considers battling the ever-infuriating summer traffic and transport strikes in Rome or London! Having said that, there is plenty of time to complete all the reading, assignments and presentations due to the lack of unnecessary distractions. The transport links are excellent for any exploration and breaks.

Can you share a memorable interaction you had with faculty, guest speakers, or fellow students?

Memorable interactions with students and faculty are manyfold. We had many a heated discussion in the classroom that would spill into a local bar or the Pasticceria Russo about the criminogenic nature of art crime, the colonial legacy of cultural property and what it means to be a “universal museum” today.

In the Museum Security course, our instructor asked us to share a profound personal experience in utmost confidence in order to build trust between us. This was a formidable exercise because our perception of each other changed and it made us appreciate each other’s experiences beyond the program curriculum.

One cannot forget the countless aperitivos and dinners shared amongst the fellow students and faculty after each milestone, whether it is a presentation or completion of a course – all are still deeply ingrained in my memory.

What advice would you give to someone considering applying for the 2026 session?

My advice would be to have a clear idea of what you want to take away from the program and target your professional and personal interests and ambitions. It is important to talk to your instructors and connect with them – they are there to help you every step of the way. The ARCA connections and networks can become a professional lifeline. If opting to do the full Postgraduate Program, you will have ten weeks to do the reading, coursework and research including presentations, essays and making an impression – it is up to you to get it done. This is a professional development program and you are in charge of what you wish to accomplish.

On the lighter note, the local bread could be used as a weapon or a door stop due to its hard texture. And, of course, bring plenty of insect repellent, the Umbrian pappataci are relentless!

How has your understanding of art crime evolved since completing the program?

My understanding of art crime since the program has evolved significantly especially in terms of understanding the international jurisprudence and jurisdictional differences, complex networks in international antiquities trafficking as well as the laborious and painstaking efforts required to recover stolen cultural property. It is impossible to visit any cultural institution and look at its displays without considering the security conditions such as security cameras, motion sensors, smoke alarms or quality of the protective cases. Equally, it is difficult to attend an exhibition or look at a museum display without paying attention to its signage and wording – is the story of plunder told or swept under the carpet, was the object “appropriated” or was it a part of the partage agreement, and what do they mean by “acquired”? The program has equipped me with analytical tools and has fed my inquisitive intellectual curiosity. Needless to say, my professional and social interactions are never a dead-end.

In one sentence: why should someone join ARCA's program?

One should join ARCA’s program if one wants to broaden their understanding of the importance of cultural heritage protection and to make a difference in art crime prevention ensuring the long-lasting impact on humankind in the form of justice being served regardless of the passage of time for the generations to come.

About Saida Hasanagic

Saida Hasanagic, MA, is an art historian based in London, England. She is an independent scholar specialising in provenance research, art crime and its prevention from perspectives of art history, art market studies and international relations. Saida worked as a provenance researcher and data analyst for the Jewish Digital Cultural Recovery Project Foundation, Berlin on The Pilot Project – The Fate of the Adolphe Schloss Collection. She is affiliated with Holocaust Art Restitution Project and The Ciric Law Firm, PLLC in the USA. Her main areas of research are European Modernism, the Second World War art plunder and restitution, and cultural crimes committed in conflicts since 1945, notably in the former Yugoslavia with focus on spoliation, recovery and restitution of cultural property in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

* Dr Edgar Tijhuis is Academic Director at ARCA and is responsible for coordinating ARCA’s postgraduate certificate programs. Since 2009, he has also taught criminology modules within ARCA's PG Certification programming. In 2026, Edgar Tijhuis will teach on criminological theories and art crime in the Post Lauream I programme.

📌 ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Programmes (Italy | Summer 2026)

• Post Lauream I (22 May – 23 June 2026): PG Cert in Art & Antiquities Crime

• Post Lauream II (26 June – 26 July 2026): PG Cert in Provenance, Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property

➡️ Take one track—or combine both in a single summer.

The man at the centre of one of Italy's biggest antiquities trafficking scandals, Gianfranco Becchina, has had his fortune restored. Should it have been?

2026-03-08T12:00:00.038+01:00

Today in Italu, it was announced that the Preventive Measures Section of the Palermo Court of Appeal has overturned a sweeping asset confiscation order issued against Gianfranco Becchina, 85, the Sicilian-born antiquities dealer whose name has been at the centre of international art trafficking investigations for more than three decades. The preventive measures panel of the Court of Second Instance, (Italy's court of appeals), revoked entirely the order issued on 22 October 2021 and made public on 26 May 2022 by the Tribunal of Trapani.

That ruling ordered the confiscation of a significant portion of movable, real estate and corporate assets "attributable to a well-known international trader of works of art and artefacts of historical-archaeological value" long suspected to have links with the Sicilian mafia, in and around the port town of Trapani, This we know was Gianfranco Becchina and by extension his family. Those assets were ordered seized on the premise that, according to the prosecution, the antiquities dealer had laundered illicit archaeological finds for the Matteo Messina Denaro clan of Cosa Nostra.

In delivering their 2026 reversal, the Court of Second Instance accepted the defence's appeals, concluding that no disproportion existed between the family's accumulated wealth and their declared legitimate sources of income, effectively ruling that Becchina's assets had been lawfully acquired. But having said that one must remember that the Italian Judge Rosalba Liso dismissed all antiquities trafficking-related charges against Gianfranco Becchina due to the running of the statute of limitations in 2011.

Judge Liso is also the judge who ordered the seizure of 5,919 of Becchina’s antiquities (seized in 2002 and 2009), holding that “from the evidence…it emerges that Becchina bought antiquities from tombaroli.” Addressing the antiquities themselves (both those seized and those depicted in the seized photographs), Judge Liso found that “all come from clandestine excavations conducted in Italy…[and that]…the copious documentation seized from Becchina definitely certifies that those objects come from clandestine excavations and excludes any legitimate provenance.”

Defence attorneys in the current case, Francesco Bertorotta, Marco Lo Giudice, and Giovanni Miceli, issued a statement asserting that the Court of Appeal’s decision restored justice to their client and his family, who, they said, had endured nearly eight years of asset seizures affecting their businesses and property. According to the defence, the ruling confirms what Becchina’s lawyers had long argued: that the family’s wealth derived from lawful professional activity.

While Judge Liso noted that a substantial portion of Becchina's wealth was generated through the sale of illicitly excavated antiquities, it should be underscored that it was the passage of time, rather than the absence of underlying misconduct, that limited the possibility of the Sicilian dealer's criminal prosecution, due to statutes of limitation.

Among the most symbolically significant assets returned under the ruling is the Palazzo dei Principi Aragona Pignatelli Cortes in Castelvetrano, an iconic landmark of the city's historic centre originally rebuilt in the sixteenth century and incorporating the Castello Bellumvider, a fortification commissioned by Frederick II in the twelfth century. Considered a monument of considerable architectural and cultural significance, this and other property has now been ordered returned to the family, eight years after their seizure in November 2017 by Italy's Anti-Mafia Investigative Directorate, through the Criminal and Preventive Measures Section of the Court of Trapani.

Prosecutors had alleged, but according to the appellate court failed to prove, that Becchina laundered illegally excavated archaeological artefacts on behalf of the Messina Denaro crime family, whose patriarch, before his arrest and subsequent death, had been Italy's most wanted Mafia boss. The courts at both levels found the allegations of a relationship between Becchina and the Messina Denaro clan difficult to sustain.

Even at the court of first instance, the Tribunal of Trapani had already rejected the Mafia association claim after reviewing the testimony of multiple informants, noting the generic nature of their statements and finding a "lack of certainty not only regarding affiliation, but also regarding specific unlawful conduct attributable to Becchina in support of Cosa Nostra." That same tribunal had also established that the vast majority of artefacts stored in Becchina's Basel warehouses originated from Campania, Lucania and Puglia on the Italian mainland.

These findings are also borne out by examination of the Becchina Archive, which revealed that over 80% of the antiquities derived from Apulia and of the Apulian vases, over 90% were traceable to a single source within Becchina's network: convicted tombarolo and later intermediary trafficker Raffaele Monticelli, and were therefore unconnected to the Messina Denaro clan in Sicily.

It is worth noting, however, that the court's rejection of a formal Cosa Nostra connection does not discount the question of organised criminality in the antiquities trade, nor Becchina's alleged role within it. Art crime investigators and cultural heritage scholars have long distinguished between two distinct, though sometimes overlapping, criminal ecosystems.

The first comprises Italy's primary poly-crime-oriented syndicates, the hierarchical organisations most commonly associated with the structured Mafia model. These groups maintain formal leadership, internal codes of conduct, long-term territorial control, and well-established codes of silence. They are, in the broadest terms, powerful transnational clans that extort, tax, or directly control criminal operations across territories with distinct geographic origins and international reach.

The most prominent of Italy's Organised Crime Groups (OCG) is the Cosa Nostra, which despite sustained pressure from law enforcement continues to maintain its territorial grip on Sicily, adapting constantly to evade scrutiny and remaining the most historically recognisable and publicly emblematic of the Italian mafias.

The 'Ndrangheta, rooted in Calabria and built upon blood ties and tightly-knit family clans known as 'ndrine, has grown into arguably the most formidable of the four, having expanded into the most countries and dominating Italy's cocaine trade through networks stretching across South America and West Africa.

The Camorra, operating primarily out of Naples and Caserta, functions through a volatile mixture of large cartels and smaller, more fractious clans engaged in drug trafficking, extortion, and illicit financial schemes, with profitable operations extending across Spain, France, the Netherlands, Germany, and Dubai.

The Apulian crime groups, namely the Sacra Corona Unita, the Società Foggiana, the Camorra Barese, and the Gargano Mafia, evolved from their origins in cigarette smuggling into a broader criminal portfolio encompassing human trafficking, drug and weapons running, as well as illegal waste disposal, with networks present in the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, and Albania.

Heritage-crime criminal ecosystems, by contrast, are more loosely structured. Often, they consist of temporary collaborations among tombaroli (clandestine diggers), middlemen, couriers, restorers, and dealers who cooperate in specific territories in relation to specific transactions.Taken together, however, these actors form a sophisticated supply chain fully capable of functioning as a form of organised crime in its own right.

Unlike traditional Mafia-styled OCGs, most antiquities trafficking OCG networks lack formal leadership structures, initiation rituals, or territorial monopolies enforced through violence. Instead, they rely on highly specialised divisions of labour, shared financial incentives, and the complicity, or at the very least the indifference, of segments of the international art market that have historically looked the other way regarding the illicit origins of the objects they traded.

The consequences of that indifference is severe. Over several decades, well-developed supply chains have enabled the large-scale, systematic removal of archaeological material from some of Italy's most significant cultural landscapes. Looted objects flowed steadily from easily exploited heritage-rich sites to storage facilities, freeports, and private galleries, where they were laundered using fabricated collecting histories and sold onward to major Western museums and private collectors.

It is within this framework that law enforcement and art crime researchers have directed sustained attention toward the activities of Gianfranco Becchina. Rather than viewing him solely through the lens of his Mafia contacts, many analysts position him as a central and well-connected node within a commercially motivated antiquities trafficking network. In this role, the Sicilian dealer functioned as a high-level intermediary whose gallery connections and market relationships enabled large numbers of illicitly excavated antiquities to enter the legitimate international art market, contributing significantly to the long-term exploitation of Italy's archaeological heritage.

Originally from Castelvetrano and for many years resident in Switzerland, Becchina operated for decades within the international art and antiquities market, and his name appears repeatedly across multiple investigations into the illicit trafficking of antiquities sourced from Italian territories. Investigators allege that over roughly thirty years he accumulated his wealth through the proceeds of international trafficking in archaeological artefacts, many of which had been clandestinely looted from sites throughout southern Italy where his cordata operated.

The scale of the damage is reflected in the volume of significant objects that have since been repatriated. Through what investigators describe as a lucrative criminal enterprise, Becchina supplied several important antiquities to the J. Paul Getty Museum and other American artistic institutions, works that have since been restituted to Italy.

Among the more notable returns, some of which have been discussed on this blog, are the Paestan red-figure calyx krater painted and signed by Asteas, the Sarcofago della Bella Addormentata, a grouping of helmets later gifted to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and an important black-figure kalpis depicting the myth of Dionysus being kidnapped by pirates whom he transforms into dolphins. These objects are just a few of the numerous works circulated by Becchina and traced through documentation seized by the Italian heritage crime authorities, which helped art crime analysts reconstruct the full extent of the network and actors involved in funnelling artefacts from Italian soil onto the international antiquities market.

This month's appeals ruling in Becchina's favour does not erase any of that contested history.

As recently as February 2025, the United States returned 107 archaeological artefacts, collectively valued at $1.2 million to Italy, items identified through ongoing investigations as having been looted and illicitly exported by traffickers including Becchina. Among the recovered objects was a fourth-century BC bronze patera that had passed through Becchina's hands before reaching a New York antiquities dealer and eventually being seized by Manhattan's Antiquities Trafficking Unit.

The appellate ruling likewise does not address the broader international record of illicit artefacts connected to Becchina's operations that have been recovered by law enforcement agencies over the past two decades, nor does it resolve the wider question of how a sophisticated, decentralised criminal network trading in looted antiquities, operated quite apart from any single organised crime family, and was able to function effectively for decades.

The consequences for Italy's archaeological heritage has been devastating and, in numerous instances, permanent. Sites cannot be unlooted. Context, once destroyed, cannot be restored. The historical knowledge embedded in the ground alongside these objects fenced to Becchina is gone forever.

What makes this court ruling especially difficult to reconcile is the striking disparity in how the law treats different categories of organised crime. Those convicted of Mafia association in Italy routinely face lengthy custodial sentences, with the full weight of anti-racketeering legislation brought to bear against them.

Those caught participating in the trade in looted antiquities, by contrast, have historically faced far more lenient consequences, despite the fact that the harm they inflict on the collective cultural memory of a nation is, by any meaningful measure, quite serious. Until the legal frameworks governing cultural property crime begins to reflect the true scale of that harm, the gap between the severity of the offence and the severity of the punishment will continue to undermine the protection of the world's shared archaeological inheritance.

By: Lynda Albertson

From Skanda Trust to Singapore: Tracing One Spunky Hanuman to Douglas Latchford

2026-02-23T19:35:00.006+01:00

If you read our recent article about the Dong Son bell identified at a museum in Assen and the troubling questions surrounding its provenance, you will recognise a pattern that extends far beyond that single suspect artefact. That case, resting on little more than a hypothetical pre-1970 export date, forms part of a larger story that has been unfolding for years. It is a story that continues to cast a long shadow over the global market in Southeast Asian antiquities, museum institutions, and private collections worldwide. Time and again, it is a story in which the fingerprints of Douglas Latchford can be found on objects that passed through his hands, sometimes decades before his alleged crimes were brought to light.

Recently, I was working to identify the Cambodian, Thai and Vietnamese artefacts purchased by Leon Black which were mentioned in some of the three million documents released by the U.S. Justice Department on 30 January 2026 as part of the Jeffrey Epstein data dump. During my wanderings my searches brought me back to Latchford's and Emma Bunker's artistic publications.

Cultivating the image of a passionate scholar-collector prior to his indictment, the Bangkok-based dealer worked closely with Bunker to publish a series of lavishly illustrated books on Southeast Asian and Khmer art that featured many of the objects he circulated through the antiquities market. Far from being neutral scholarly exercises, these publications functioned as instruments of laundering.

Sculptures and bronzes with little or no documented provenance were presented alongside established museum holdings and described as significant works from private collections. They were framed within authoritative art historical narratives that obscured both their true ownership history and the circumstances of their removal from Cambodia. By embedding freshly surfaced objects in academic-style volumes, Latchford and Bunker effectively manufactured a sort of cosmetic legitimacy, transforming recently trafficked antiquities into catalogue-worthy published masterpieces, thereby smoothing their path into major collections.

Thumbing through the pages of their 2011 book Khmer Bronzes: New Interpretations of the Past my eyes paused briefly on a piece I recognised. It was a bronze statue of Hanuman, the monkey general of the Indic epic poem Ramayana, who helped Rama rescue Sita from the demon Ravana.

In the book Latchford and Bunker went on to describe the unusual piece as coming from Angkor Borei, adding:

This fierce little Hanuman once surmounted a battle standard to which he was attached by a short tang under the foot. Hanuman waves his arms vigorously as he balances on one foot, a pose very similar to that of a gilded-bronze male figure from Vietnam in the Musee Guimet that has also been identified as a standard emblem. Hanuman is often represented in later Khmer art.

In their 544-page tome, and including this bronze, there is an outstanding number of pieces, which appear courtesy of "Skanda Trust." Formed just three months before the book’s publication, Skanda Trust is now understood to have been one of Latchford’s offshore vehicles, registered in Jersey in the Channel Islands, and estimated by experts to have held art-related assets valued at approximately $10 million. An email from Latchford dated 23 April 2007 to a New York dealer left little to no doubt about the dealer's level of direct involvement and knowledge in transnational criminal activity against Cambodian artefacts. In it Latchford offered his colleague (and sometimes cohort in crime) a looted standing Buddha from the same pre-Khmer site of Angkor Borei. That artefact was depicted in a photo that showed signs of recent excavation.

So where did this Hanuman wander off to?

In a 2017 Facebook post, the Asian Civilisations Museum shared a photograph of an eighth-century bronze monkey figure identified as probably depicting Hanuman and coming from Angkor Borei. The figure was described as unusual because it was unclothed. I had saved a screenshot of that image for use in my course on open-source intelligence research in object tracing. It served as an excellent example of how museums use social media and how such posts can reveal information about objects in their collections, even when full catalogues are not accessible online or researchers cannot physically visit a specific institution in another country.

That is why the image clicked in my memory when reviewing Latchford’s publication. They were one and the same. The museum appears to have acquired the bronze in 2014 and assigned it Accession number: 2014-00439.

The presence of this Hanuman in a Latchford publication, attributed to Skanda Trust and later accessioned into an important museum collection, is not a trivial detail. It places the object squarely within a museum collection that has already led to previous restitutions to India.

In recent years, the museum has begun to confront the uncomfortable reality that publication history and aesthetic importance cannot substitute for clear, documented provenance. If they are serious about transparency and ethical stewardship, then works linked to Latchford’s orbit warrant their careful review.

The question is no longer whether these objects are beautiful or significant. It is whether they left Cambodia lawfully. One hopes that this bronze will receive that scrutiny it needs, and that if the evidence points where other cases have led, that his path home will be quick.

By: Lynda Albertson

When Provenance, Policy, and Limited Museum Due Diligence Rings Old (Alarm) Bells

2026-02-21T12:10:00.028+01:00

Few dates have shaped museum acquisition practice as profoundly as 1970. The adoption of the UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property has come to function not only as a legal reference point but as a moral dividing line. In many institutions, an object documented outside its country of origin before 1970 encounters fewer obstacles. After 1970, the questions begin in earnest.

But what happens when the decisive date is 1969?

In 2004, the National Carillon Museum in Asten, now known as the Museum Klok & Peel, purchased this iron age bronze temple bell attributed to the Dong Son culture and dated to the second century BCE. The bell, 57 cm in height, was acquired by the Dutch museum via Antwerp dealer, Marcel Nies. According to the information supplied by the dealer it had been excavated in Battambang, Cambodia, exported to Thailand in 1969, transported to Italy in 2000, and eventually made its way to Belgium in 2003 where it was bought by the museum in 2004 and assigned inv. no. 3149 O 457.

To finance the acquisition, the museum applied for a subsidy from the Brabant Museum Foundation, but the Foundation hesitated. Was the purchase compatible with international agreements governing cultural property? It asked the Ethical Code Committee for Museums - formerly the Museum Code of Conduct Committee to review the case.

The Commission framed its advice around two questions: whether the museum had complied with the relevant provisions of the professional code of ethics, and whether it had exercised sufficient care in investigating the provenance of the bell. The export date of 1969 was noted as falling just before the 1970 UNESCO Convention. Although the Netherlands had not ratified the Convention at that time, the Dutch ethical code expected museums to act in accordance with its spirit.

The Commission acknowledged that the proximity of 1969 to 1970 might raise doubts. Nevertheless, it found no reason to question the stated circulation of the piece as supplied by Nies. On that basis, it concluded that illicit trade, as defined under the code, was not at issue and that the acquisition had been carried out with appropriate care. The Brabant Museum Foundation accepted the advice and the purchase proceeded.

The advice, however, was not unanimous. One member of the commission dissented and stated that he "would have been in favour of asking the opinion of the government of the country of origin in order to overcome the one-sidedness of the information available to the purchaser". If doubt existed regarding provenance, as he believed it did, the museum should not proceed. Even before 1970, he argued, the object should not have left Cambodia without authorisation from the relevant authorities.

This minority view will later take on greater resonance.

In 2005, Jos van Beurden revisited the case in the academic journal Culture Without Context. His analysis focused on two aspects that had received relatively light treatment in the Commission’s recommendation. The first concerned the certainty of the 1969 date. The Commission had referred to the possible coincidence of 1969 and 1970 but ultimately accepted the dealer’s account's of the object's circulation. Yet, in subsequent conversations Nies reportedly described 1969 as only "most probable" rather than definitive. The boundary between acceptable and problematic rested on a date that was not firmly documented, and instead amounts to hearsay.

The second issue concerned Cambodian law. The assertion that no permission was required for export from Cambodia to Thailand sits uneasily with information we know about Cambodia's cultural property laws. Extensive legal protections for Cambodia's cultural heritage date to the French colonial period, the early years of the country's independence, the Khmer Rouge period, as well as modern times.

In 1863, a treaty between France and the Kingdom of Cambodia established Cambodia as a protectorate of France. In 1884, a Convention between the Kingdom of Cambodia and France gave the administrative power of the State to the French, giving the French Governor for Cambodia power over all territory.

Both a 1900 decree law and a 1925 decree expressly state Cambodian cultural artefacts as being the property of the state. According to these, no object could be exported without the authorisation of the Governor General, something the Dutch museum's bell does not have.

Following the adoption of a new Constitution in 1993, earlier existing laws remained in force unless expressly repealed. Legal experts, including former Director of UNESCO's Department of Cultural Heritage Lyndel Prott, supported the view that the 1925 legislation had not been abrogated by the intervening turmoil of the Khmer Rouge period. If her interpretation was correct, the removal of the bell from Cambodia without authorisation would have been in contravention of domestic law, regardless of whether it occurred before or after 1970. Taken into focus, the dissenting commissioner’s suggestion therefore that Cambodian authorities should have been consulted before this object's purchase now appears less an outlier than a missed opportunity.

Despite this, the museum’s co-founder and curator, Dr André Lehr (1929-2007), defended the acquisition that the Ethical Commission had approved. What more, he asked, could reasonably be required? Implicit in that response was a narrower understanding of cultural heritage, one that placed greater weight on monumental works of art than on portable everyday religious objects.

Yet for source countries such as Cambodia, portable antiquities are integral to the archaeological record as well as to national cultural identity. The distinction between movable and immovable, monumental or portable has little relevance in the country's heritage law and even less in the lived experience of loss among its people.

But this Asten case illustrates how the year 1970 has come to function as a kind of ethical shorthcut. For many institutions, “pre-1970” suggests relative safety, while “post-1970” triggers more rigorous investigation. Over time, the date has risked becoming less a reference point for inquiry than a substitute for it. If a buyer can be convinced that an object can plausibly be placed outside its country of origin before 1970, the intensity of scrutiny may diminish.

The difficulty is that plausible is not the same as proven.

The later history of a similar Dong Son bell underscores this point. In 2005, the British antiquities dealer Douglas Latchford donated a Dong Son bell (accession number: 2005.105) to the Denver Art Museum. No provenance or publication history accompanied the artefact.

A prominent collector and dealer in Southeast Asian antiquities, living in Thailand, Latchford was indicted in the United States for crimes related to a many-year scheme to sell hundreds of looted Cambodian antiquities on the international art market. In September 2020, the indictment against him was dismissed following is death.

Prior to his Denver donation, Latchford had attempted to sell two other Dong Son bells to a private American buyer one year before the Dutch museum purchased their own from Nies. In a 2003 email Latchford described the bells as rare and referred to a recent find in the Battambang region of northwestern Cambodia, noting that he had been able to obtain several examples. Photographs taken before cleaning of these objects showed encrustations consistent with recent excavation not a storied life in a permanent collection.

In November 2021, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York announced a civil forfeiture complaint seeking the return of four looted Cambodian antiquities from the Denver Art Museum. Three of these, including the Dong Son bell were gifts from Douglas Latchford, while the forth had been purchased by the Thai-based dealer outright. Later that month, the DAM deaccessioned the pieces from its collection and they were picked up by U.S. officials for return to Cambodia

While the Denver case does not establish that the bell acquired by the Dutch museum in Asten is illicit, it does, however, reveal how narratives once accepted as adequate can later unravel. References to a “recent find,” coupled with physical evidence of fresh excavation, transformed what might once have been treated as plausible provenance into grounds for forfeiture. And Latchford's association with other Dong Son bells from Battambang further sharpens our scrutiny of the Dutch bell's collection story.

While there are other instances of bells of this type in circulation within the art market. the parallels in both museum acquisitions are difficult to ignore. Both the Denver and the Assen bells are stated to have been found in Battambang and both circulated through Thailand where Latchford lived and operated.

Both also have limited to no documentation with a heavy reliance on the donor or dealer's stated account as to their origins. And in both cases, institutional approval was based on circumstantial information provided by the individual proffering the work for aquisition or donation.

Marcel Nies has stated in the past that he never sold any piece on behalf of Latchford directly and that he wasn’t aware of the gravity of the allegations against the antiquities dealer until he was indicted. Despite this, seven artefacts in Nies publications match to Skanda Trust artefacts which were published in Latchford’s and Emma Bunker's books.

Formed in June 2011 Skanda Trust was an offshore vehicle registered in Jersey in the Channel Islands, where antiquities Latchford owned could be held in trust, sheltered from the government investigation, and with his daughter Julia Latchford listed as a trustee. Likewise a "privately owned" Dong Son bell is illustrated in: Emma C. Bunker and Douglas Latchford, Adoration and Glory, The Golden Age of Khmer Art, Chicago 2004, no. 2.

For cultural policy observers, the comparisons are instructive. It suggests that the absence of disconfirming evidence at a given moment does not resolve underlying uncertainty. It also highlights the evolving expectations placed on museums today as what was considered reasonable due diligence in the early 2000s may no longer suffice.

Back in 2004, the dissenting member of the Dutch Ethical Commission proposed a straightforward step: consult the source country. At the time, that suggestion did not prevail.

Today, direct engagement with source-country authorities and subject matter forensic researchers is increasingly viewed as standard due diligence practice when documentation is incomplete, vague, or contradictory. The burden of proof is finally shifting toward demonstrating lawful export rather than relying on the absence of proof to the contrary.

This shift reflects broader changes in the governance of cultural property. Source countries have become more assertive in seeking restitution and international cooperation has intensified. High-profile cases involving traffickers have exposed the fragility of dealer-based narratives where once vague provenance statements like: Private collection Italy, 2000 once sufficed. As result, forward-thinking museums have responded by strengthening provenance research, enhancing transparency and, in some cases, revisiting past acquisitions.

The bronze bell purchased in Asten in 2004 sits at the intersection of these complex developments. The Dutch Ethical Commission concluded that the Assen acquisition complied with the applicable code and that sufficient care had been taken. Within the framework applied at the time, that conclusion may have been defensible. Yet the minority opinion and subsequent events invite reconsideration of what sufficiency should mean.

The 1970 Convention remains a cornerstone of international cultural property policy. It provides an essential baseline. But it was never intended to function as a rubber stamp date for hypothetical transactions that left their countries of origin in circumstances that remain unclear. Treating 1970 as a bright line can obscure the continuing relevance of domestic export laws and the ethical imperative to seek clarity when doubt arises.

The Asten and Denver bells together illustrate a larger point. Provenance research is not merely an administrative exercise. It is an inquiry that unfolds, sometimes over decades, shaped by new evidence, evolving norms and changing relationships between museums, identified bad actors in the art market and source countries.

Decisions that appeared settled in one decade now look provisional in the next.

By Lynda Albertson

Provenance Without Disclosure: The Afterlife Sales of Jeffrey Epstein’s Collection

2026-02-14T10:27:00.002+01:00

"A man is rich in proportion to the number of things

which he can afford to let alone."

- Henry David Thoreau

There has been a quiet, uncomfortable afterlife for the contents of Jeffrey Epstein’s 71st Street townhouse in New York. Reviewing photos released among the millions of documents and photos released by the U.S. Justice Department on 30 January 2026 related to the Jeffrey Epstein investigation and comparing them with recent sales events its fairly easy to match artworks and furnishings once found in his home to at least two “select” auctions run by Millea Bros. While the world has demanded transparency regarding this monster, for the art world it is business as usual.

Without catalog descriptions disclosing Epstein as the owner or Epstein's estate as the consignor, the New Jersey auction house's first three-day auction was held June 11-13, 2025 which we will discuss here. A second, by the same firm, occurred in December.

Among the robust number of Epstein owned paintings depicting nudes, some postwar, some not, his tacky sculpture of Alice in Wonderland and Little Red Riding Hood in a brawl and a replica sculpture in the style of Amedeo Modigliani was his c. 1820, Austro-Hungarian map desk, with four front to back drawers to each side, moulded pilaster dividers, and brass escutcheons with rosette covers. For this piece, auctioneers Michael and Mark Millea stated the provenance as;

Purchased from J.P Molyneux Studio, Paris in 2006; House of Liechtenstein

Remaining unsold, it is depicted in a photo which shows the now-deceased billionaire speaking with Stephen K. Bannon in his abode from behind the same desk. To the rear of Epstein we can also see a grouping of circular paintings depicting sculls, which sold in the auction for $900.

A portrait visible in the same photo titled Girl With Vegetables, after Portrait of a Young Cook, by Giuseppe Nogari's (Venezia, 1699 - 1763). It sold for $500.

Epstein's Belgian carved walnut bookcase, seen in photos stacked with lotions and creams in the room where his employees testified at Ghislaine Maxwell's trial that Epstein received about three massages every day by the time he left his job in 2002. sold for $800 listing only Alain Helmroth in the provenance.

A limited edition bronze by French sculpture Arnaud Kasper titled Regard sur le monde, (a look at the world) listed no provenance whatsoever. It once adorned the mansion's staircase and was under a different name as Female Nude stripped of the Epstein-added bridal attire for $1500.

The omission of this individual's name matters because Epstein’s “provenance” is not a neutral footnote. His New York was filled with works of art which underscored a depraved lifestyle on of his visiting guests batted an eye at, including a large painting by Jorge Alvarez titled Coming of Age Ceremony (1995), which depicts a nude underage boy with explicit arousal. It was put up for sale by Collective Hudson, LLC in September 2025 with a provenance of purchased from the artist.

In addition to the object's mentioned in this article there are Olmec carvings, Precolumbian gold pieces, Chinese, Himalayan, Etruscan, Greco-Roman, Egyptian, and Leventine pieces, all of which are equally spartan on their previous origins and are worth following up on.

Having said all that, and despite the fact that the sale proceeds of these dark, rotten trappings of wealth are said to benefit a victims’ compensation fund, knowing the origins and provenance of items remains essential for buyers and for the integrity of the market. Disclosure allows would-be purchasers to make an informed ethical choice about whether they want to live with, display, or later resell objects tied to an individual associated with such horrific abuse.

When a prior owner is intentionally omitted, as has been the case with these auctions, the sales channels are complicit in reputation laundering for profit, scrubbing away, through absent or bland catalog language, the objects' ownership chain and leaving future buyers oblivious to the material facts and circulation of their purchase,

Provenance is not a trivial detail. It directly affects value, future resale, and institutional acceptance. Withholding it shifts reputational and financial risk from the seller to the unsuspecting buyer in much the same way Nazi tainted pieces deserve careful review.

Compensating victims and informing the public are not mutually exclusive goals. A restitution-minded approach should coexist with full and forthright disclosure of an object’s most recent ownership history, particularly when that history is precisely what many buyers would consider decisive.

By: Lynda Albertson

Subsidising Uncertainty: Who Pays For Bad Provenance?

2026-02-12T07:06:00.002+01:00

Last Fall, the French Ministry of Culture took a notable step toward strengthening accountability in the museum sector by preparing a comprehensive provenance research guide for public institutions titled: Handbook for provenance research

For the attention of directors and scientific managers of museums in France,
and public collections under the Ministry of Culture. The initiative was designed to help museums systematically investigate the ownership histories of artworks and archaeological objects, particularly those acquired during periods associated with widespread looting, colonial extraction, or illicit trafficking. By formalising expectations around due diligence it its museums, France was taking important steps in signalling that provenance research is no longer an optional scholarly exercise, but a core responsibility tied to public trust.

Across the Atlantic, the contrast remains striking. While the French government moved to develop clearer institutional guidance, the United States government, which has no Ministry of Culture of its own, has yet to develop comparable federal recommendations for museums that benefit from public subsidies, tax exemptions, and donor-supported acquisitions. In the absence of national recommendations or guidelines, U.S. museums largely self-regulate their provenance practices, relying on lawyers or internal policies approved by their boards of directors that vary widely in rigour and transparency.

This regulatory gap raises a pointed question: why are American taxpayers left exposed to subsidising donations of artworks that may later be shown to have been stolen or illegally exported?

The issue is not hypothetical. When museums accept donations of art with incomplete or problematic ownership histories, their donors often benefit from substantial tax deductions based on the object's appraised value. If those same objects are later seized or relinquished due to their problematic origin, the financial risk has already been absorbed by the American public. In effect, its US taxpayers who have underwritten both the acquisition and the reputational fallout, while the institutions themselves face few standardised federal requirements requiring them to demonstrate that adequate provenance research was conducted prior to accepting a gifted work of art.

In the U.S., the primary federal touchpoint for donated artworks is the Internal Revenue Service, which evaluates donations almost exclusively through the lens of valuation and tax deductibility. The IRS requires donors to substantiate fair market value and complete appraisal documentation, but it does not meaningfully assess whether an object was lawfully exported, ethically acquired, or free from claims by source countries. As a result, the legal status of an artwork’s past is often treated as peripheral, so long as its monetary value can be justified.

France’s model suggests a different path, one in which government agencies acknowledge that provenance research is not merely an internal museum matter but a public accountability issue. By issuing a government-backed guide, the state is taking the first steps of establishing a baseline for responsible stewardship, one which creates clearer expectations for institutions that operate with public support. Such guidance does not eliminate complex provenance questions, but it does reduce ambiguity and by doing so strengthens institutional accountability going forward.

Advocates of due diligence in US museums can argue that similar federal guidelines in America could help protect cultural heritage, improve public confidence, and help ensure that charitable tax policies are not inadvertently rewarding the circulation of looted or illicit material.

As international scrutiny of museum collections continues to grow, the absence of U.S. federal provenance standards is increasingly difficult to justify. France has demonstrated that government leadership in this area is both possible and practical. Whether the United States will choose to follow suit, and in doing so safeguard both cultural heritage and public funds, remains an open and increasingly urgent question.

The Long Road Home: The Recovery of San Lucas from Astudillo

2026-02-05T16:48:00.005+01:00

Detail of the altarpiece of the main altar of Santa Eugenia

In 1927, a black-and-white photograph published in Historia documentada de la villa de Astudillo by Anacleto Orejó quietly documented a masterpiece in situ. The image shows a polychrome wooden sculpture of San Lucas, attributed to the celebrated 15th-century sculptor Gil de Siloé, positioned in the predella (the lowest tier) of the altarpiece in the Church of Santa Eugenia de Astudillo, in Spain’s Castilla y León region. At the time, the photograph served a purely documentary purpose. Decades later, it would become critical evidence.

On the night of 17–18 July 1979, the church was targeted by thieves. Four polychrome wooden sculptures depicting the Evangelists, among them San Lucas, all attributed to Gil de Siloé, were removed from the predella and stolen along with a silver censer. The theft was later linked to René Alphonse Ghislain Van den Berghe, the notorious trafficker of sacred art known as "Erik the Belgian."

Considered to be the greatest art thief of the 20th century, by his own admission, Van den Berghe is believed to have stolen over 600 works of religious art including altarpieces, capitals, crosses, panel paintings, carvings, tapestries, books, paintings, goldsmiths’ works, and furniture from churches and religious institution across Spain.

Active across Europe during the 1970s and early 1980s the sticky-figured thief was eventually arrested in Barcelona in 1982. But despite his capture, the stolen works from Astudillo had vanished into the international art market, where they remained untraceable for decades.

That silence was broken more than forty years later when a photo of the polychrome sculpture depicting Saint Luke was recognised by the directors of Theotokopoulos Gallery María Elizari and Pedro Ramón Jiménez in sales material advertising an upcoming auction at Cambi Casa d'Aste in Genova, Italy. Misattributed to the 20th century Italian sculptor Angelo Biancini with an unbelievably low estimated sales price. After studying the piece and determining its origins they notified the Historical Heritage Section of Spain's Civil Guard.

Moving decisively, the Spanish Guardia coordinated with Italy’s Carabinieri to have the piece withdrawn from sale and to secure the object, while documentation concretising the match could be forwarded to the Italian authorities. Shortly thereafter the Palencia Public Prosecutor’s Office initiated formal judicial proceedings seeking its return. Because the discovery occurred outside Spanish territory, the presiding judge was asked to issue an international arrest warrant for the crimes of theft and receiving stolen goods, an essential legal step to establish jurisdiction and enable restitution.

Yesterday the Evangelist was finally home. Having been released to the Spanish authorities, an official handover ceremony was held at the Diocesan Museum of Palencia and was attended by the Bishop of Palencia, the Deputy Director General of Registries and Documentation of the Ministry of Culture, the Director of Cultural Heritage of Castilla y León, the General Chief of the Zone of the Civil Guard in Castilla y León, and representatives of Italy's Carabinieri TPC Command.

This case stands as a powerful example of what determined cross-border cooperation between law enforcement agencies can achieve, while also exposing a deeper and persistent vulnerability. Churches, particularly in rural or economically challenged areas, remain among the most at-risk heritage sites affected by art crime. Their treasures are often fragile, poorly inventoried, openly accessible, and only lightly protected. As this case demonstrates, stolen works can disappear into circulation for decades, passing silently from hand to hand, before a single trace allows them to be found and brought home.

Likewise, the recovery of San Lucas underscores the enduring value of paper, not just digital archival records, which can be critical in ascertaining ownership. It also serves as a reminder that safeguarding religious heritage is not merely a matter of devotion, but of vigilance, without which centuries of cultural history can vanish in a single night.

Bosnian-Dutch Suspect in Cocaine Trafficking and Art-Linked Money Laundering Extradited from the UAE to the Netherlands

2026-02-04T20:01:00.010+01:00

Stefan Papic on Flor Bressers' luxury yacht.

A Bosnian-Dutch national, accused of playing a key role in a major European cocaine trafficking network and suspected of laundering drug proceeds through the art world, has (finally) been extradited from Dubai to the Netherlands.

Stefan Papić, 30, the owner of Puro Arte, an art gallery registered in both the Netherlands and Sarajevo based in Breda, was arrested in Dubai last year, but until recently his extradition appeared unlikely. He was sought under a Belgian European Arrest Warrant (EAW) in connection with one of the country’s most high-profile organised crime and drug trafficking investigations. Conducted jointly by Belgian and Dutch authorities, that investigation focused on a network accused of importing large quantities of cocaine concealed in manganese ore shipments shipped from South America and routed to Kriva Rochem, an Antwerp-based water purification company.

Dutch and Belgian prosecutors allege that Papić is a close associate and lieutenant of the principal suspect in the Kriva Rochem investigation, Flor "De Lange" Bressers. Bressers is currently on trial with 32 defendants, including Brazilian Sergio Roberto De Carvalho charging them with for participation in a criminal organisation responsible for importing at least 16tonnes of cocaine into Europe. Originally scheduled to begin in October 2024 the complicated case has resulted in multiple delays and heated disagreements between lawyers and the court which has resulted in several motions to recusal.

The Belgian authorities consider Papić, who used the alias 'Max' on Sky ECC, to have been key in the financing, logistics and laundering of money gained from this network's cocaine trade, including via his art gallery in Breda, which is also associated with his family. A search of said gallery, first in 2019 and later in 2020, led to the discovery of links to Edin "Tito" Gačanin, the leader of the Balkan-based Tito and Dino drug cartel named as part of a “super cartel,” run by Gačanin alongside Irish drug kingpin, Daniel Kinahan, Italian mafia boss Raffaele Imperiale, and Dutch-Moroccan trafficker, Ridouan Taghi.

The Kriva Rochem investigation has attracted intense scrutiny from law enforcement across multiple jurisdictions, with prosecutors linking the network to hundreds of millions of euros in narcotics revenue. The case has also implicated the ringleader Bressers in the alleged black-market acquisition of Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer by Dutch Golden Age master Frans Hals, which was stolen on 26 August 2020 from the Hofje van Mevrouw van Aerden Museum in Leerdam.

Papić's gallery in Breda, was searched as part of a multinational police operation looking into the alleged illegal activities and affiliates of Bosnian Dutchman Mirza Gačanin, also a member of the Tito and Dino clan, which was led by his nephew Edin "Tito" Gačanin. Mirza has been cited as having laundering drug profits through the purchase of European real estate, including the commercial property which Papić's gallery occupied in Breda. He was sentenced in absentia to four years in prison in December 2022 and was lature arrested in the Spanish city of Alcante on an Interpol warrant.

If proven in court, the alleged use of Papić’s art gallery as a laundering vehicle exposes both the infiltration of organised crime into the financial flows of cultural goods and the ease with which the legitimate art market can be manipulated to conceal and launder criminal proceeds.

While art crime is often associated with theft and illicit antiquities trafficking, financial investigations into high-value art transactions sometimes illustrate that money laundering is an important vector by which criminal networks can "clean" profits generated from drugs, fraud, or other predicate offences. Given the subjective value of art, this case underscores how galleries, auctions, and private sales can provide convenient cover for lucrative transfers that are otherwise difficult to substantiate.

Meet Our Alumni: From Photochemistry to Art Crime: Catarina Pinto’s Bridge into Cultural Heritage Investigation

2026-01-29T16:19:00.003+01:00

How did the international nature of the program influence your learning experience?

Personally, it was quite challenging. Learning and consolidating concepts outside our area of expertise is already demanding itself. Doing so in a foreign language increases the difficulty even more. However, this need for adaptation is excellent for personal and professional growth. At the beginning, it was very challenging and at some moments even discouraging, but over time we open ourselves to the experience, becoming richer and more mentally flexible.

Did the program change or shape your career path?

Definitely! After the program, I remained ambitious about combining chemistry with the field of Art Crime and Safeguarding. Therefore, I always actively seek opportunities that bring me closer to this goal. At the moment, I am a researcher in the cultural heritage group SCITEC, where, through laboratory studies, we try to respond to museum needs in practical cases related to conservation and prevention.

My perspective, however, goes beyond chemistry. I observe the context of the object, its provenance, and I question more directly aspects such as lighting — where, how, and its specific location in the museum (when relevant). This perspective derives from having participated in the programme. I also continue to stay in touch with projects, workshops, and conferences in order to nurture my enthusiasm and keep myself updated on scientific developments applied to the security and preservation of cultural heritage objects.

What was it like to live and study in Amelia, Italy?

Personally, it was very easy. I loved being in a small place where you can be part of the city and feel at home even though you are foreigner. Amerini welcome you with an open heart.
Depending on your own background and personality, you may experience some difficulties due to it being a small city. However, that the same fact is what makes it so special in everyday life.

If you need help, you will get help. You will be in the heart of Amerini. And this is the most amazing thing about living in Amelia.

Can you share a memorable interaction you had with faculty, guest speakers, or fellow students?

Everyone, from day one, is welcomed as you part of a family. Each year, coming back to the Conference, feels like you never left. It is as if the time had not passed, as if you had not been away for so long. This is my most memorable interaction: feeling welcomed into a family, that you never really left and, experiencing how open the guest speakers are towards the students from the very beginning.

What advice would you give to someone considering applying for the 2026 session?

Be open. Enjoy every little moment – the goods ones, the bads ones and even the boring ones. In the end, you will want to relive it all again, without exceptions. This, is the magic of ARCA’s program.

How has your understanding of art crime evolved since completing the program?

When I enrolled in the program, even my imagination could not predict what I would discover. All the concepts, all the sub-fields. Personally, I have evolved a lot. I started from a point where even the concept of “restitution” was not part of my vocabulary. Now, every piece of news regarding repatriation, safeguarding agreements and so on feels natural.

In one sentence: why should someone join ARCA's program?

It will open your mind to the importance of safeguarding cultural heritage and make you part of a family that works for a greater good.

About dr Catarina M. Pinto

Catarina M. Pinto is a researcher at the Italian National Research Council's Institute of Chemical Sciences and Technologies (CNR-SCITEC, Perugia). She holds a PhD in Photochemistry, focused on the study of photodegradation mechanisms of historical and natural colourants. She also holds Master's degree in Forensic Chemistry applied to cultural heritage and a Postgraduate Certificate in Art Crime and Safeguarding. Her research specializes in the photodegradation studies of organic dyes and pigments, in textiles and paintings, by spectroscopic techniques for the safeguarding of cultural heritage.

* Dr Edgar Tijhuis is Academic Director at ARCA and is responsible for coordinating ARCA’s postgraduate certificate programs. Since 2009, he has also taught criminology modules within ARCA's PG Certification programming. For more info about the program, contact Edgar Tijhuis, or contact ARCA via the link below.

📌 ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Programmes (Italy | Summer 2026)

• Post Lauream I (22 May – 23 June 2026): PG Cert in Art & Antiquities Crime

• Post Lauream II (26 June – 26 July 2026): PG Cert in Provenance, Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property

➡️ Take one track—or combine both in a single summer.

Ancient Women, Modern Crime: How Etruscan Women Were Trafficked Across the World

2026-01-29T13:07:00.009+01:00

I have long been fascinated by the reddish-buff clay figures of barefoot women placed along the eaves of ancient Etruscan roofs. Dressed in impeccably folded, vividly coloured chitons, women like the protagonist of this article once danced in procession, some alongside their companion Silenus, caught in revelry with the wine god Dionysus. They were meant to watch over temples, to move eternally in rhythm above daily life.

How this happily intoxicated woman was smuggled out of Italy and into a "Private Collection, Switzerland" remains a mystery, though the contours of her journey are painfully familiar. Long before she caught my attention, others before me had been chasing their own trafficked ladies, recognising them instantly when they surfaced on the art market with little or contrived collection histories, a tell-tale sign that they did not run away voluntarily, and instead were the byproducts of clandestine excavations, conducted in Etruscan cities.

For two decades, Italian authorities have known just how desirable these elegant women are to collectors and museums. Maurizio Fiorilli, Italy's avvocato dello Stato and ARCA lecturer Stefano Alessandrini chased them. As did Paolo Giorgo Ferri, Rome's Sostituto Procuratore della Repubblica working closely alongside Dr. Daniela Rizzo and Maurizio Pelligrini from the Villa Giulia.

Left and Middle: Restituted from the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek
Right: Restitute from the J. Paul Getty Museum

Thanks to painstaking legal and scientific work, sifting through the stacks of probative evidence supporting Italy’s claims and in close collaboration with Italy's Carabinieri Command for the Protection of Cultural Heritage, some of these trafficked Maenads have found their way home. The first was acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 1996 and returned to Italy in 2007 and the others were relinquished by the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in 2016, though only after years and years of foot dragging.

Paolo and Maurizio both shared with me the chillingly coded language used by American dealer Bob Hech when discussing the delivery of "children" by his associate Fritz Bürki in a letter written to Mogens Gjødesen, the Copenhagen museum's director from 1970 to 1978.

Dear Mogens,

Since Bürki is anxious to see Copenhagen, I shall let him accompany the children (provided Swiss or Swedish - excuse me - Scandinavian airlines permits the children inside). If not, he will send them. If he does, he would advise you in advance, so that your shipper might be there to help him. Maybe I too shall come. We figured some time around the 4th - 6th January.

All the best to you + Marianne

Sinc..

Left: Antefix recovered from London
Right: Antefix found at excavations conducted in 1938-39
at the Campetti di Veio, collection of Villa Giulia

Seeing these historic objects as the embodiment of actual people, children no less, made my blood boil. And it wasn't too long after that when I began my own hunt for ancient lost souls. My first pursuit led to the identification and with a lot of effort on many people's part, the recovery of a Maenad from Veii offered for sale at Christie’s London.

Her journey became the narrative spine of Lot 448, a documentary which premiered at the 2021 virtual Tribeca Film Festival sponsored by Bulgari and directed by Bella Monticelli. Remember her name. She too caught the antiquities trafficking bug, and ARCA will share more of her work as a trafficking sleuth in the near future.

But back to the 6th century BCE "Hurrying Maenad" who is the protagonist of this article.

She too was spotted at Christie's, though this time in New York. I came across that piece in an exhibition catalogue for an event held during the summer of 1991 at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, highlighting recent donations from the the Etruscan collection of the late Ivor Svarc of California, along with loans of supplementary material from Jonathan Rosen, the business partner of Robert Hecht, the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire in Geneva and from private collectors and other museum collections in Israel.

Aside from the fact that the photo on the cover of this exhibition catalogue depicts another suspect artefact, a terracotta pair of galloping horses, inside the thick book contains entries by Giovannangelo Camporeale, Fiorella Cottier-Angeli, George Ortiz, and Christoph Reusser, names that have, at times, prompted debate and concern within the illicit trafficking field. Each of these authors collaborated with Ines Jucker (née Scherrer, 1922-2013), the scholar and sometimes ancient art dealer responsible for curating the exhibition cited in the Christie’s lot description for the most recent Maenad.

The provenance for this now headless woman in the Christie's sale read:

Elsa Bloch-Diener (1922-2012), Bern, 1975 (Antike Kunst, no. 113).
Private Collection, Switzerland, acquired from the above, 1975;
thence by descent to the current owner.

Elsa Bloch-Diener (1922–2012) too was a Swiss art dealer who operated a gallery at Kramgasse 60 in the old town of Bern. She too collaborated with Jucker who authenticated pieces on her behalf.

Returned from the United States in late December, This latest recovered Maenad will rest her feet for a while at the Museum of Rescued Art, within the Octagonal Hall of the Baths of Diocletian, alongside her sisters, the antefixes returned from the Getty and the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek.

Together, each speaks softly of journeys not of their own making. Torn from the cities they once animated and roughly carried across borders and oceans by unseen hands, these barefoot girls, forever poised in music and motion, remind us that the paths traced by looted objects are rarely their own. Their return is not simply a matter of geography, but of belonging restored after years of forced removal.

I suspect this will not be the last of the ladies dedicated officers and heritage crime analysts identify. Their music still lingers, echoing across centuries, waiting for those willing to listen closely enough to want to bring them home. And I for one am grateful to the Carabinieri for doing the heavy lifting to bring this girl home.

By Lynda Albertson

The Theft at Zilvermuseum Doesburg and the Evolving Mechanics of Museum Crime

2026-01-22T09:02:00.002+01:00

This week's theft at the Zilvermuseum Doesburg represents a troubling example of how cultural institutions, particularly smaller museums, are increasingly vulnerable to targeted criminal activity. In an early morning burglary, two offenders gained access to the museum, located in a suspended gallery inside the historic 13th-century Martinikerk or Gret Church in the heart of Doesburg since June 2021.

The burglars gained entry at 4:30 am on Wednesday morning through the church tower entrance. Using a crowbar, they forced open two doors before breaking their way into all fourteen display cases in the gallery. IN and out in a matter of minutes, they stole the entirety of the museum's displayed antique silver, totalling hree hundred handcrafted objects from more than twenty countries, handcrafted between 1700 and 1920.

From an art crime perspective, the efficiency and scale of the theft strongly suggest planning rather than opportunism. The thematic collection, assembled over decades by Martin de Kleijn, consisted of hundreds of silver objects, many of the mustard pots highlighting the fact that the city has been a producer of the condiment since the 15th century. While individually modest in market value, taken together the collection represented a coherent body of cultural material whose worth far exceeded its melt value.

What makes this case particularly instructive is the likely fate of the stolen objects. Unlike high-profile artworks that can be circulated in illicit but recognisable markets, antique silver presents a different criminal calculus. Rising bullion prices have made silver an increasingly attractive target, and criminal networks are well aware that such objects can be rapidly broken down, melted, or fragmented to facilitate resale. Once reduced to raw material, the cultural, historical, and evidentiary value of the objects is permanently lost.

This pattern has been observed repeatedly in recent years. Thieves targeting museums are often not seeking to traffic identifiable works but to extract material value quickly, eliminating the risk associated with selling recognisable stolen heritage. For collections like that of the Zilvermuseum, this reality makes recovery unlikely once the objects leave the premises, unless sufficient evidence can be gathers to tie the thieves to the crime before deconstruction can occur.

The Doesburg theft is not an isolated incident. As discussed already on ARCA's blog, across Europe museums have experienced a rise in both overnight burglaries and rapid daytime thefts involving items which can be broken down for the sum of their parts. In many cases, offenders exploit predictable security routines, limited visitors and staffing, or historic buildings that were never designed to address violent, and fast acting criminals. Smaller institutions are particularly exposed, as they often lack the resources for advanced surveillance, physical reinforcement, or round-the-clock monitoring.

Recent cases demonstrate that speed is central to contemporary museum crime. Criminals frequently remain on site for only minutes, focusing on specific objects that can be removed quickly. The objective is not long-term concealment but rapid conversion into cash through illicit channels.

The theft from Zilvermuseum Doesburg underscores a growing gap between the responsibilities placed on museums and the financial resources available to protect collections. While large institutions face public scrutiny when security fails, smaller museums suffer losses that can be existential. Entire collections, as was this case in the city of Doesburg the were built through personal dedication and community support, can disappear overnight.

From an art crime prevention standpoint, this case reinforces the need for a reassessment of how cultural property risk is evaluated. Material-based collections, particularly those composed of precious metals, now face heightened threat levels. Preventive strategies must account not only for theft intended for resale as art, but for destruction motivated by commodity markets.

The loss in Doesburg is therefore not only a local tragedy. It is a clear signal of how cultural heritage crime continues to adapt, prioritising speed, anonymity, and irreversible loss. Without coordinated investment, intelligence sharing, and tailored security strategies, similar collections elsewhere are likely to face the same fate.

Part of a Pattern, Saved by a Sting: The Mariemont Ming Porcelain Theft

2026-01-13T12:39:00.000+01:00

On 21 April 2024, at around 4 a.m., three masked individuals forced their way into the Musée royal de Mariemont, 50 km south of Brussels, in an early morning burglary. Security footage and later press statements make it clear that this was not an opportunistic break-in: the thieves knew the building, knew the collection and moved with purpose, stealing only one object, a 500 year old Ming dynasty (16th century) wine jar with an aquatic motif, acquired in 1912 from a Brussels antique dealer by Raoul Warocqué, the museum's founder.

They headed directly to the East Asian gallery, where this exceptional piece, produced in the imperial workshops of Jingdezhen, in southern China stood in a glass display case. Despite a double alarm system that activated and triggered the standard response from security staff, the intruders were in and out of the building in roughly six minutes, taking only this singular jar from its pedestal and leaving the rest of the collection untouched. By the time local police, alerted by the guarding team, arrived, the burglars and their prize were already gone.

For Mariemont, it was the first theft of this kind. For museum security specialists, the modus operandi looked uncomfortably familiar. Since 2010, museums in England, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands and Germany have suffered targeted thefts of high-value Chinese ceramics, often in fast, well-organised raids against a single masterpiece or a small group of objects.

Ransom, Roubaix and a police sting

The story might have ended there, with a masterpiece disappearing into a private collection, if the thieves had not tried to cash in on their prize. In the weeks after the burglary, the museum was reported received a ransom demand of 2 million euros in exchange for the safe return of the jar.

Belgian and French police, already cooperating on the case, used the demand to set up a sting operation. Investigators from the French Brigade de recherche et d'intervention and the brigade de répression du banditisme in Lille worked with their Belgian counterparts to organise a fake handover in Roubaix, in northern France. On 28 May 2024 the undercover officer travelled to a small parking area, apparently alone and carrying a bag that was supposed to contain the ransom money.

When two young men arrived by car to collect the bag, they found themselves surrounded within seconds by dozens of plain-clothes officers. At almost the same moment, police recovered the wine jar a short distance away and arrested additional suspects from France and Belgium. In total, multiple individuals, several already known to law enforcement, were taken into custody. The jar’s lid had been damaged during the theft, but the object itself had survived.

For the museum, the recovery was described as an “unbelievable” outcome and a near-miraculous success, given the value, rarity and recognisability of the piece.

Monday's Charleroi court decision

On 12 January 2026, the Tribunal correctionnel de Charleroi delivered its judgment in the Mariemont case. Nine of the ten defendants prosecuted in connection with the theft and ransom plot were convicted and received prison sentences ranging from 18 months with suspension to 4 years of effective imprisonment.

The court recognised the organised nature of the operation. The thieves had entered by force in the middle of the night, gone straight to a unique object classed as a cultural treasure, and then attempted to extort a multimillion-euro ransom. The pattern matched the broader trend identified by police and cultural heritage experts: structured criminal groups targeting specific items, in this case Chinese imperial ceramics, in museums.

The Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles, as owner of the museum and the jar, joined the proceedings as a civil party. It sought 22 million euros in damages, reflecting both the market value of the Ming masterpiece and the harm caused by the damage to the object during the theft as well as staff costs. The court, however, granted only a provisional award of one euro, noting that the community would need to provide more detailed expert evidence to quantify the exact extent of the damage to such a rare and almost incomparable work.

The tribunal did, however, accept that the jar had indeed suffered harm as a result of the crime. In addition, the court awarded compensation for material losses, costs linked to replacement staff during sick leave, and moral damages suffered by two guards and the museum director, whose professional and personal lives were directly affected by the burglary.

The Fédération now has the option to develop a fuller damages case, supported by conservation assessments and comparative valuation, if it wishes to return to court.

A case that resonates beyond one museum

The Mariemont burglary is more than a spectacular “vase heist” with a satisfying police sting at the end. It sits within a troubling pattern in which museums holding Asian ceramics, especially Ming and Qing dynasty wares, have become targets by organised groups who know exactly what to take and how quickly to get out.

Other recent museum thefts with similar modus operandi have been recorded, including at the Keramiekmuseum Princessehof in Leeuwarden in February 2023, the Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst Köln in Cologne in September 2023, and the Musée National Adrien Dubouché in September 2025.

The case also underlines the vulnerability of small and medium-sized institutions that hold objects of global importance. Mariemont’s Ming jar is not just a Belgian treasure, but one of a handful of such imperial pieces in Western collections. Its theft and partial damage show how much is at stake in a matter of minutes when a museum is treated as a soft target for high-value crime.

Finally, the Charleroi judgment illustrates an unresolved tension in cultural heritage crime: courts can and do punish the perpetrators, but calculating meaningful compensation for damage to unique works remains extremely difficult. No insurance payment or civil award can fully restore a sixteenth century imperial jar to its pre-theft condition. That difficulty does not reduce the responsibility of criminals who treat cultural property as a commodity, but it complicates how legal systems adjudicate the true cost of their actions.

In Mariemont, the jar will eventually return to display, accompanied by a new chapter in its history: five centuries of imperial banquets, a century in a Belgian collection, six minutes in the hands of thieves and, thanks to careful police work and a recent court decision, a second life as a case study in how fragile and how resilient cultural heritage can be.

By Lynda Albertson

Interview with Ibrahim Bulut, Senior Security Consultant and Museum Security Expert.

2026-01-10T07:16:00.001+01:00

* Dr Edgar Tijhuis is Academic Director at ARCA and is responsible for coordinating ARCA’s postgraduate certificate programmes. Since 2009, he has also taught criminology modules within ARCA's PG Certification programming. To apply for the 2026 programmes, request a prospectus via the email below or contact Edgar Tijhuis for other questions.

📌 ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Programmes (Italy | Summer 2026)

• Post Lauream I (22 May – 23 June 2026): PG Cert in Art & Antiquities Crime

• Post Lauream II (26 June – 26 July 2026): PG Cert in Provenance, Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property

➡️ Take one track—or combine both in a single summer.

The Partridge Chase: How two Roman toddlers led Spain to a trafficking breakthrough

2026-01-08T13:48:00.003+01:00

Today, two extraordinary Roman bronze genre statues, each depicting a young toddler leaning forward with open arms pursuing a partridge were formally presented at the Museo Arqueológico Nacional having been relinquished voluntarily back to Spain by the collector who purchased them and voluntarily return to Spain. The little girls, leaning forward with open arms and splayed fingers, stretching toward a bird that is just out of reach were forged somewhere between the1st century BCE and the early 1st century CE.

In 2012, Christie’s had announced their sale, estimating a purchase price of between $3-5 Million USD, and listing the artefacts as coming from a "private collection, the owner’s family having acquired them from renowned Swiss collector Giovanni Züst in the 1960s, whose collection formed the nucleus of Basel’s famed Antikensammlung."

Züst, (Basel 1887 - Rancate 1976) was an important collector not only of paintings but also of ancient objects and is most well known for having donated 600 objects of Etruscan and Greek art to the Swiss museum.

That ownership narrative however proved to be categorically false.

Christie's purchased the bronzes in a private transaction for $3 million and then sold them on to a collector. Two years after the initial Christie's publicity, the striking pair were loaned to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and given temporary accession number: L.2014.38.3a, b.

But by 2023 the truth about the pair's murky origins began to publically unravel in published reports regarding an acquittal in Lugano, Switzerland on charges of fraud, and subsequently embezzlement, for a suspicious transaction.

At the centre of that dispute were the two ancient bronze figures, whose origins were hotly contested by a then 51-year-old Swiss man from Mendrisiotto and an 80-year-old Italian already noted for crimes related to the illicit trafficking of cultural property, as well as looting and smuggling.

The Swiss defendant claimed the bronzes had belonged to his family for generations, while the private prosecutor, alleged that the bronzes were found by his grandfather on land in Spain with prosecutors suggesting the most likely scenario was that the pair of bronzes came from an archaeological site in Spain near the accuser’s residence and were then transported abroad without authorisation.

Between 2006 and 2007, photos taken at the accuser’s house in Spain documented the poor condition of the two bronzes, showing them in need of conservation. This negates the credibility of the 1960s Swiss collector Giovanni Züst ownership narrative which was presented to the auction house. The artefacts were subsequently handed over to the Italian for restoration and later circulated through London as well as Ticino, Switzerland, before ultimately making their way into the hands of Christie's collector who loaned them to the New York museum.

The private accuser in the Swiss case claimed false documents were prepared asserting that the bronzes were family heirlooms and even concocting the fictitious association with the renowned Swiss collector. When half of the sale proceeds were not paid as agreed, the accuser filed his complaint in the Swiss courts in 2018.

As the case wound its way from the lower court to the Court of Criminal Appeals, the prosecutor in the case voiced his doubts about the origin stories exchanged between the warring parties, stating: "It is hardly credible that there are no family photos (of the 51-year-old, ed.) showing the two bronzes, much less expert opinions if his ancestors were indeed art collectors. Even more unusual, not to say absurd, that two statues worth millions of dollars were exchanged in the parking lots of a shopping center (between the two defendants, ed.)."

All of this ultimately worked to the advantage of investigators. Spain’s Historical Heritage Brigade and the Central UDEV (Specialized Violent Crime Unit) of the Policía Nacional, supported by the Spanish Embassy in Switzerland, the Ministry of Culture’s Subdirectorate of Registers and Documentation of Historical Heritage, the National Archaeological Museum and the Customs department of the AEAT, concluded that the bronzes had been looted from Spain between 2007 and 2008, and were part of a illicit trafficking and money laundering scheme that has impacted Spain for almost two decades.

With collaboration of Homeland Security Investigations, the toddlers were officially announced today during a handover ceremony at the Museo Arqueológico Nacional, attended by members of the National Police, the head of the Central Unit for Specialized and Violent Crime, José Ángel González, and representatives of the Ministry of Culture. The bronzes will now enter the national collection, where they can be studied and appreciated by the public rather than hidden behind false pedigrees.

Yet their journey also stands as a stark reminder that cultural property crime is far from a relic of the past. Spain’s archaeological heritage continues to face real and persistent threats from looting networks, forged provenances and the international market’s willingness to profit from high-value objects with only cursory due diligence, ignoring thin or implausible histories. Recoveries like this one are true victories, but they also highlight how much work remains to ensure that cultural heritage is protected, not commodified, and that the stories buried beneath the soil of source countries are not erased for private gain.

By: Lynda Albertson

Book Review: Unseen: Art and Crime in Australia

2026-01-08T11:24:00.003+01:00

Title: Unseen: Art and Crime in Australia

Author: Penelope Jackson

Publisher: Monash University Publishing, Clayton, Victoria, 2025

Reviewer: Dr Vicki Oliveri, Australian-based Art Crime Researcher

Penelope Jackson's use of the word ‘unseen’ as the main title of her new book is a clever descriptor to employ, as it captures various aspects of art history and art crime in Australia where knowledge gaps exist. Each chapter explores these gaps and provides pertinent details that too often are left out, not only in the backstory of an artwork and art crime, but also in their present status. Jackson further enriches these details by analysing why such gaps exist.

In Chapter One, “An Exhibition of Missing Art”, Jackson presents us with a collection of missing (and still to be recovered) artworks. Included in this “exhibition” is what she dubs the “inaugural ‘known’ theft” [in 1926] from the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) – The Gentle Shepherd, by Scottish artist Sir David Wilkie (p. 12). In this chapter, Jackson makes the important observation that in Australia, “while some missing artworks are acknowledged, others are not. There’s no right answer, or definitive rule, about how to deal with acknowledging missing artworks” (p. 11). As is her style throughout this book, Jackson explores the backstories of this and the other missing artworks, as well as analysing the many aspects of the term ‘missing’ itself.

In Chapter Two, “Artnapping and Recovering Art”, when recounting well-known art thefts, Jackson goes beyond the usual re-telling and delves a bit deeper. For example, with the 1986 theft of Picasso’s Weeping Woman from the NGV she tries to understand what the fascination is with this particular heist (p. 36). The Weeping Woman was recovered but, as Jackson rightly points out, “so often a work’s theft and recovery are not acknowledged by the gallery” (71). As this chapter highlights, it’s not only the missing works that are “unseen” but also details about them.

Copies of artworks can also fall into the category of ‘unseen” too, as discussed in Chapter Three’s “A Mania for Copies”. In a world of art forgeries, it is refreshing to read about the place of legitimate copies of art and their role in Australian art and cultural history. Here we read about famed copies such as the ubiquitous Portrait of Queen Elizabeth II (1954) by William Dargie, also known as The Wattle Portrait, in reference to the yellow ballgown worn by the Queen. Then there is the Australian public’s obsession with William Holman Hunt’s The Light of the World. The replica that went on tour in Australia was painted in the period 1900 – 1904 and it is estimated that four million people came out to see it (p.85). Many saw the painting “several times” and, as Jackson notes, with a national population of five million at the time, the visitor numbers were indicative of “an incredible event and achievement, demonstrating the popular taste for the subject matter and style of art” (p. 85). Copies have since fallen out of favour with few remaining on display and, over time, copies “can be passed off as authentic artworks” (pp 103-104). This is why provenance research is vital, to help distinguish authentic works from any replicas or intentional fraudulent art.

Chapter Four’s “In Verso” tackles cases of fraudulent art through the lens of the artwork’s verso. It is, in a sense, the backstory of the back-of-a-painting’s story. The details noted on the back of an artwork, and those that aren’t, can provide evidence to “help establish and confirm a work’s provenance” (p. 106). Focusing on the verso is a creative and intriguing method of exploring these cases of art crime.

When it comes to art crime Jackson notes that “Every country has a Dobell” (p.138). She is, of course, referring to the famed Australian artist William Dobell, known (amongst other things) for his Archibald Prize winning portraits of Margaret Olley and Joshua Smith. In her research, Jackson has noted that Dobell’s works have “regularly been at the forefront of illegal behaviour” (p.138), so much so that she devotes the whole of Chapter Five to him – “Stealing Dobell”. In this chapter, Jackson chronicles twenty cases (!) involving Dobell, many not well-known, if at all.

With so many art crimes remaining unsolved, it’s not surprising that the available data on the extent of this criminal activity is hard to come by. Jackson addresses the challenges of data collection, such as the way art crime is classified by Australian criminal law, but she takes the topics of ‘numbers’ a lot further in Chapter Six – “Painting by Numbers”. Money talks so yes, the chapter does begin with monetary value of artworks which so often dominates the headlines (such as the National Gallery of Australia purchasing Jackson Pollack’s Blue Poles in 1973 for a record $1.3M) but, as Jackson notes, “Art historians have traditionally shied away from including monetary information in their narratives” (p. 179). This chapter covers a variety of areas, from the ‘numbers’ provided by art sales, to what is meant by the term “prolific” (a word artists are often tagged with), to acknowledging the role data and statistics can make in “redressing the imbalances of individual artists, and group of artists, as the subject of exhibitions or being represented in collections” (p.199) – trying to make the unseen, seen.

Finally, in Chapter Seven, “Damaged Goods”, Jackson profiles a number of artworks that have been damaged by accident, vandalism, theft, fires, and natural disasters, and how an “object’s status can change irrevocably when damaged, regardless of how good its restoration is” (p. 218). Cases include the devastating destruction caused by the unprecedented level of flooding in Lismore in 2022. Despite staff following their Disaster Plan, Lismore Regional Art Gallery suffered terrible losses, where the “final tally saw 60% of the collection deemed unsalvageable” (p.226). This has understandably led to questions being asked about the efficacy of Disaster Plans and the locations of cultural institutions (p. 227). The chapter also looks at the rise of activism which garners attention through vandalising art.

By adopting a holistic narrative approach, that goes beyond the typical finish line of other historical accounts of art crime, this book becomes an exemplar on how to write a full history of an art crime, and the life of an artwork itself. And for those new to art crime Jackson provides definitions throughout the book of the different types of crimes committed against art, including unpacking the tricky terms 'fraud'; and 'forgery'; and their application in Australian criminal law. There is also a handy glossary.

Overall, this book is such a good read because, along with the themes and backstories developed in this book, Jackson rewards the reader with lots of art-historical gems scattered throughout the text. For example, the serendipitous way in which she came across an unfamiliar colonial artist, Eliza Blyth, who created beautiful botanical artworks but who has all but been forgotten (pp.25-26). Then there is poignant case of a stolen Albert Namatjira painting, Areyonga Paddock, James Range (1957) which he had gifted to the girls at the Cootamundra Domestic Training Home for Aboriginal Girls. A plaque had been attached to the painting’s frame noting that it had been presented to the girls there. Sadly, although the painting was recovered, the plaque was missing, which caused the former residents significant hurt (pp 70-71). Then you have the curious case of the nineteenth century painting Chloé, by Jules Joseph Lefebvre, which suffered numerous attacks and eventually became a “landmark of Melbourne’s urban history” (pp. 223).

In the book’s “Afterword” Jackson writes that by discussing the backstories of artworks she hopes “to have opened up new ways of looking at Australian art” (p. 254). She has more than succeeded in doing just that. Unseen: Art and Crime in Australia is an important and welcomed addition to the growing canon of Art Crime texts.

Boris Vervoordt’s TEFAF Appointment Sparks Debate on Leadership, Influence, and Problematic Art

2026-01-07T17:41:00.003+01:00

Axel Vervoordt Co is a family-led business.
Boris (left) and Axel (right).Image Credit: TEFAF

In a surprising turn for the international art fair circuit, Dominique Savelkoul stepped down as Managing Director of the European Fine Art Foundation, (TEFAF), at the end of December in what was described by the foundation this week as "differing views on the strategic direction." This marks the second leadership change in just over one year at one of the world’s largest fair providers for fine art, antiques, and design, covering 7,000 years of art history.

TEFAF confirmed this week that, Boris Vervoordt, one of the sons of Belgian art and design dealer Axel Vervoordt, and a driving force behind his father's influential Axel Vervoordt Co, has been named chairman since 1 January 2026 and that the fair's executive committee members will each take turns leading the foundation for a period of six months. Vervoordt is the first non-Dutch chairman to steer Europe's prominent art foundation and on paper, brings visibility, experience, and an enviable network of ultra-high-net-worth clients to the foundation's annual New York and Maastricht fairs.

Well known in the art world for cultivating an enviable black book of high-profile collectors and luxury tastemakers, Vervoordt arrives to TEFAF's management with deep familiarity of the fair’s culture and commercial ecosystem having been a participant from the fairs beginnings. Active in the international world of art, design, and antiques since the late 1960s, the family of Belgian art dealers have sold everything from Egyptian marble bowls, to contemporary Japanese paintings and Le Corbusier armchairs.

In it's current iteration, Axel Vervoordt Co, was founded in Belgium in 2011 (and in Hong Kong in 2014). Their art gallery, arts and antiques trading organization, interior design and real estate development divisions are headquartered, since 2017, outside Antwerp, at an industrial complex known as Kanaal. Part gallery, part exhibition space, Vervoordt's showcase institution is housed in a former malting distillery and malting complex built in 1857 on a shipping canal leading to the port of Antwerp, though many Vervoordt-held companies are registered elsewhere.

Over several decades, Axel and Boris Vervoordts' clients have included Bill Gates, Calvin Klein, Mick Jagger, Givenchy, Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren and Sting and his wife, Trudie Styler. But their brand extends beyond the art market into interior design, with widely publicised commissions for minimalist fusions of East and West, have been developed for petroleum heiress Betty Gertz in Texas, actor Robert De Niro’s TriBeCa penthouse in New York, and Kanye West and Kim Kardashian's home in the Hidden Hills neighbourhood of Calabasas in California to name a few.

Vervoordt has also been connected to the interior redesign of a listed villa in Cap d’Ail on the French Riviera associated with shell companies tied to sanctioned

Russian telecoms oligarch Sergei Nikolaevich Adonev, whose vast financial empire and holding companies have been identified as receiving investment and support from various figures linked to the Kremlin and Vladimir Putin. These high-end affiliations underscore the breadth of the Vervoordt network, but also highlight the degree to which the family's businesses have profited in proximity to politically exposed or controversial figures.

Rostec boss Sergei Chemezov, Vladimir Putin and multi-millionaire Sergei Adonyev

A Pattern of Troubled Objects

While the Vervoordt name carries clout among the Who's Who in the art world, the family firm can also been linked, in several documented instances, to objects identified as stolen, looted, or connected to problematic provenance histories, a few of which our outlined here. Taken individually, these cases reflect the complexities of the art and antiquities market. Viewed together, they reveal a pattern that raises questions about whether Vervoordt's commercial considerations at times superseded rigorous vetting and the ethical stewardship expected in handling the world’s cultural patrimony.

In the 1980s Axel Vervoordt purchased the floor you see in this photo of his library at 's-Gravenwezel castle, the medieval fortress surrounded by 60-hectares of park land he calls home. After the parquet de Versailles floor was restored and published in the October 1986 issue of Architectural Digest, French authorities informed him that the flooring had been stolen from a French château.

Later, in March 1998, at a time when the art world's big players paid little attention to whether an artwork offered for sale could have been stolen during the Second World War, Axel Vervoordt brought the painting Sumptuous Still Life with Lobster, Oysters, Silvergilt Covered Beaker, Silver Mounted Kendi Wine Flask and Glassware by Pieter Gerritsz van Roestraten, (21 April 1630 – 10 July 1700), a Dutch Golden Age painter, apprenticed to Frans Hals to TEFAF's fair at the MECC Exhibition and Convention Center in Maastricht.

Its provenance, stated:

"Doweswell, circa 1900; A. Schloss Collection, Paris; Private Collection, Belgium"

Remarkably, neither the Vervoordt gallery, nor their buyer raised any eyebrows.

This despite the fact that the painting is recorded in publicly available wartime asset lists as having been taken during World War II from the renowned Schloss Collection, assembled by Adolphe Schloss—a German-Jewish collector whose family holdings, including more than 300 paintings were seized during the Nazi occupation. Documentation related to the Schloss seizure, including official French postwar recovery reports and international claims lists, identified the still life among the numerous works looted from the Schloss family collection.

The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs even stated where the then holder of the Van Roestraten painting as: "Private collection, Belgium. Castle of 's-Gravenwezel, the six-story castle home Axel Vervoordt shares with his wife May in Belgium. Deflecting from its non pristine past, Vervoordt sold the painting at the Maastricht fair along with the silver matching ewer which is depicted in the artist's work. The painting sold for $800,000 to an unnamed European private collector.

Again, not shying away from World War II sensitivities, in 2011, Le Monde, art critic and correspondent Philippe Dagen reflected on an exhibition curated by Axel Vervoordt at the Palazzo Fortuny in Venice. He noted that while the inaugural Artempo show had been widely admired, and its successor In-Finitum had leaned heavily into a lavish presentation of works associated with Vervoordt, the Belgian's third installment, TRA, included an absurd work by Cuban artist Tania Bruguera: a heavy iron sculpture emblazoned with the phrase: Arbeit macht frei, translated as "Work makes [one] free."

Following the rise to power of the the National Socialist German Workers' Party in 1933, this phrase was posted above the entrances of several Nazi concentration camps, including Auschwitz. According to Dagen, the piece appeared without contextual explanation, leaving visitors to encounter one of the Holocaust's most charged symbols of the twentieth century with no curatorial framing. This absence of interpretation, he suggested, contributed significantly to the discomfort surrounding the exhibition’s presentation.

Leaving aside the Second World War, the Vervoordt family has also handled antiquities which can be traced to problematic origins. By 2014 Dr. Morgan Belzic, a leading researcher in conflict antiquities originating from Libya had identified Vervoordt's firm as having advertised a suspect Greek Hellenistic head (Belzic D.16) which was said to come from a "Private collection F.B., Barcelona, ca. 1970; Private collection, Europe, before 1970."

Those familiar with Belzic's work on identifying stolen artefacts from Cyrenaica, the region in North Africa located between Roman Egypt and Tripolitania; today it is part of Libya know that his identifications have lead to restitutions, some of which have been discussed on ARCA's blog. Often, that same research, in favourable jurisdictions, has resulted in restitutions of cultural property to Libya. Note that the absence of a face, or aprosopy, remains without real parallel in any other location in the rest of the Mediterranean world. Likewise, this object's first appearance in circulation on the international art market coincides with the Second Libyan Civil War (2014–2020), which marked a large uptick in material appearing on the art market from illegal digging around Cyrene, near Shahhat, during the country's instability.

Also in 2014, Vervoordt's firm brought a first century BCE South Arabia (Yemen) alabaster Relief of a Male Figure with Elaborate Hairdo and Horns to TEFAF's Maastrich fair. For that event, the gallerist listed the object's provenance as: "Ancient collection Belgium, acquired in 1940; Ancient collection M. Abdalla Babeker, Sudan, acquired between 1917 and 1930."

It should be noted that "M. Abdalla Babeker" has been identified as a false-collector name which has come up in provenance records linked to stolen artefacts from Sudan circulated and sold by Jaume Bagot, of J. Bagot Arqueología in Barcelona. That problematic Catalan dealer, frequently discussed on ARCA's blog, is known for having handled stolen Egyptian shabtis of the Pharaoh Taharqa and Senkamanisken which were illegally exported out of North African country and sold onward in the European ancient art market with this same Babeker provenance.

In 2016 Kayne West visited Vervoordt’s stand at TEFAF in Maastricht ahead of the design firms work on the California mansion he shared with his then-wife Kim Kardashian. According to U.S. Court documents filed in California, an 11 March 2016 invoice made out by Vervoordt's firm to Noel Roberts Trust, listed the sale of a well worn artefact referred to as "Fragment of Myron Samian Athena."

This object was seized by US Customs and Border Protection at the Los Angeles/Long Beach Seaport on 15 June 2016 as part of a 40-item shipment weighing more than 5 tons collectively valued at over $745,000. A form submitted by a customs broker lists the importer and consignee of the items as "Kim Kardashian dba (doing business as) Noel Roberts Trust," an entity linked to Kim Kardashian and Kanye West’s US real estate purchases.

That same Roman sculpture was photographed at Vervoordt's booth in TEFAF by the Italian Carabinieri on 21 March 2011 as well as next to a second suspect object from Cyrenaica photographed at Vervoordt's Kanaal exhibition space the following year.

Nowadays, Vervoordt's family brings fewer pieces of ancient art to their TEFAF fair booth, opts more often than not for contemporary paintings, minimalist furniture and Wabi Sabi artworks, a hat tip to the Japanese philosophy that finds beauty in imperfection.

Even so, the few that have been displayed still come from questionable backgrounds, just far enough removed from their illicit circulation as to make them untouchable by Dutch law. Take for example this 11th century CE sandstone Khmer Figure of a Male Deity on sale at Vervoordt's Maastrich stand in 2023 or the 13th - 14th century sandstone head of Buddha in Lopburi style the family brought in 2025.

Both ultimately trace back to decades-old transactions involving a corrupt Chinese-Thai antiquities dealer named Peng Seng, also known as Arthorn Sirikantraporn. Based in Bangkok, Seng was a well-known supplier of artefacts of murky origins, many transiting through France and the UK. He was known to have worked closely with indicted dealer Douglas Latchford, (1931–2020), as well as Robert Rousset, (1901-1981), of Compagnie de la Chine et des Indes, the dealer in France both of these pieces were shipped to once purchased for the European market.

A letter, mentioned in the 2019 US Federal indictment against art dealer Douglas Latchford and later reported in an article published by the the Australian Broadcasting Company, describes perfectly, how Seng and Latchford agreed to work together to fabricate provenance so plundered material from southeast Asia could be whitewashed into the licit market in London, clearly circumventing source country cultural property laws.

That letter, written by a representative from the auction house Spink & Son, casts doubt on the legitimacy of hundreds of items sourced by Seng in the 60s and 70s and later sold to private collectors, galleries, and museums around the world.

It read, in part:

"I would consider my visit there most successful. The financial situation being what it is, I was anxious to spend as little money as possible in purchases and get as many pieces on consignment as possible. I am glad to say it worked out better than I expected."

"I bought a beautiful Baphuon female torso from Peng Seng for $ 13'000, a small, but exquisite Baphuon head from Chai Ma for $ 2'000 and four pieces from Douglas Latchford for $ 20'000. These Bangkok purchases, together with a vase from Mayuyama, $ 8'500, bring the grand total of my purchases on this trip to $ 43'500."

"The greater part of my time in Bangkok was spent in numberous [sic] meetings with our friend Douglas, I am getting the following two important pieces on consignment:(they are supposedly already on their way)."

"Pre Angkor Hari Hara, about 35", supposedly recently excavated in Cambodia near the South Vietnamese border, It is a great piece. The selling price will be $ 300'000 or over, still to be decided upon with Latchford."

"Large Koh Ker female torso; another very beautiful and important piece, selling price $ 100 000 or more, to be determined still."

"Douglas has the following 3 bronzes which at this time he is not ready to give me yet, but which I am sure will come in the very near future."

"I have explored extensively with Peng Seng and Latchford how to get legitimate papers for the large Koh Ker guardian and for all subsequent shipments. The following is the best procedure that I can think of at this time: For the Koh Ker guardian Peng Seng will send us a letter written and signed somebody in Bangkok. He will say that he has seen this piece in Peng Seng's shop three years ago. Peng Seng would like us to give him the exact text we want in this letter. You and I will discuss this when I am in London."

"On all future shipments of important pieces only, both Peng Seng and Latchford, they will ship the pieces the way they have always done, but at more or less the same time will send a modern piece of about the same size and same subject, described on the airway bill in such a way that nobody will know to which this airway bill applies. From my discussions with Sherman Lee I can say that an airway bill which describes the shipment as a sculpture, rather than "personal belongings", would be satisfactory. It also occurred to me that: we are mostly talking about Khmer art from Cambodia, being shipped out of Thailand, which is not the country of origin, this should lessen our problem."

Peng also communicated in detail with Robert Haines, the David Jones Art Gallery director, explaining to him that he would still send the gallerist plundered Ban Chiang pottery, despite the ban put in place by the Prime Minister of Thailand prohibiting their export in 1972.

Although TEFAF’s vetting committees have, over the years, approved the display of long-looted pieces, links like these, to networks identified in criminal investigations into antiquities trafficking, raise serious questions about the consistency and rigour of the fair’s vetting standards. The fact that an object may now fall outside a statute of limitations does not resolve the ethical concerns surrounding its removal, circulation, or sale. For many observers, TEFAF’s willingness to showcase such works suggests that its vaunted vetting procedures risks becoming a matter of form rather than substance, an institutional gesture that satisfies procedural requirements, making objects "legal now", while sidestepping the deeper moral obligations inherent in stewarding cultural heritage.

Can TEFAF uphold its ethical commitments while being led by someone whose professional history intersects with so many provenance disputes?

The answer to this question matters. Not only for collectors and curators, but for the broader conversation about accountability in what is circulating on the art market. TEFAF’s next chapter will be judged not just by the quality of works it presents to its wealthier clientele, but by whether it can maintain integrity and transparency at a time when the global art market should be looking at prior ownership and circulation with more scrutiny.

One thing is clear. TEFAF’s next Management chapter will be closely watched, not just for what exhibitions and sales it delivers under its new management and oversight, but to observe how its new leadership navigates ethical credibility alongside profit.

Interview with Marcel Marée - Egyptologist and curator in the Department of Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum

2026-01-05T21:35:00.004+01:00

As part of ARCA’s ongoing effort to give prospective participants a deeper look behind the scenes of our Postgraduate Certificate Program in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection, Edgar Tijhuis* speaks with our faculty members about their work, their motivations, and the learning environment we create each summer in Italy.

This series aims to offer future participants a personal glimpse into the people who teach with ARCA, the community around it, and what to expect in the coming year.

To begin, could you tell us a bit about yourself?

I am an Egyptologist and curator in the Department of Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum. Through my curatorial work and easy access to sale catalogues, I began to notice recurring problems on the art market: artefacts with dubious histories, questionable practices by sellers, and a striking lack of transparency. As I researched further, it became clear that a significant number of antiquities in circulation can be traced back to recent looting events and are being laundered through false or misleading provenances.

In response, I founded the Circulating Artefacts (CircArt) project in 2018, which I have led ever since. The project applies rigorous provenance research to the trade in cultural heritage, with the dual aim of facilitating the recovery of illegally sourced artefacts and preserving the historical information that so often is lost through plunder and trafficking. The project is currently transitioning into an independent organisation under a new name, to be formally announced next year.

I regularly provide research, expertise, and training to heritage professionals and relevant authorities across Europe, North America, and MENA countries. I work closely with the Border Security and Management Unit of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and am a founding member of its Heritage Crime Task Force, which responds to requests for investigative assistance from member and partner countries.

I take a strong interest in the role subject specialists can play in the fight against heritage crime. Early on, I became aware of ARCA’s pioneering efforts to build bridges among all parties in this endeavour – from prosecutors and law enforcement officers to archaeologists and representatives of the trade. I strongly support ARCA’s work, and our collaborations continue to develop and bear fruit.

You have been part of ARCA’s community for some time. Have you attended the annual Amelia Art Crime Conference or previous programmes? And do you have one memorable moment or insight you would like to share with future participants?

I have been actively involved with ARCA’s programmes since 2018, contributing courses and supervising several Capstone theses. One of the most striking aspects of the programme is the students’ exceptional motivation and intellectual engagement, which consistently elevates the quality and depth of the discussions. Their commitment plays a crucial role in shaping a vibrant and supportive ARCA community that extends well beyond the classroom.

What particularly distinguishes the programme is the diversity of participants’ professional and academic backgrounds. This creates a uniquely productive forum for constructive dialogue and meaningful skill-sharing, bringing together perspectives from heritage professionals, law enforcement, researchers, legal experts, and others working in relevant areas. This interdisciplinary exchange provides a solid foundation for developing the professional networks, shared knowledge, and practical infrastructure needed to effectively address the illicit trade in cultural property.

I have attended several of the annual Amelia Art Crime Conferences. They are intellectually stimulating and very motivational, offering a unique opportunity to engage with leading practitioners in the field, exchange ideas across sectors, and strengthen professional connections that often translate into lasting collaborations. People like us are thinly spread, so we rely on networking to maximise the impact of our work.

From your perspective, what makes ARCA’s Postgraduate Certificate Program truly unique and valuable?

ARCA’s Postgraduate Certificate Program is truly unique because it creates a sustained and structured framework for dialogue among professionals who rarely have the opportunity to learn with one another in such a focused area of interest. It brings together participants with widely divergent backgrounds and skill sets – archaeologists, law enforcement officers, legal scholars, forensic analysts, museum professionals, and art market stakeholders. This encourages them to engage not only across disciplines, but across professional cultures.

This kind of interdisciplinary exchange is not merely beneficial; it is essential. The illicit trade in cultural property operates across jurisdictions, sectors, and legal systems, and no single profession can address it effectively in isolation. ARCA’s programme fosters the shared vocabulary, mutual understanding, expertise, and trust required for meaningful collaboration, helping participants to better understand each other’s constraints, priorities, and modes of operation.

Equally important is the programme’s strong emphasis on practical skills and real-world case studies, which bridges the gap between theory and practice. By equipping participants with both conceptual tools and applied methodologies, ARCA contributes directly to improving the effectiveness of investigations, prosecutions, and preventative measures. In this sense, the programme does not simply educate individuals; it helps build the collaborative infrastructure that is indispensable for countering the illegal trade in art and antiquities. Enhanced communication and collaboration between all relevant parties is essential to achieve a higher success rate in counteracting the trade in stolen art and artefacts.

How does the location in Italy — surrounded by centuries of cultural heritage — enhance the learning experience for participants?

I have no doubt that the setting deepens the participants’ sense of inspiration and cultural awareness. That said, cultural heritage is everywhere, and the issues ARCA addresses are by no means confined to Italy.

What the location does offer is a tangible reminder of the long temporal depth and fragility of cultural heritage, and of the cumulative and irreversible impact that poor management and loss can have over time. Being immersed in a place where archaeology, architecture, archives, and living communities intersect will sharpen the participants’ awareness of what is at stake whenever cultural objects, or parts thereof, are removed from their contexts and enter illicit or poorly regulated markets.

In this sense, the Italian setting functions less as a backdrop and more as a quiet point of reference, reinforcing the programme’s core themes without overshadowing its global scope or analytical focus.

Are there particular site visits or practical elements during your course that you find especially valuable?

From my perspective as a speaker, what I find most valuable is the amount of time the programme allocates not only for the presentation of teaching materials in appropriate depth, but also for sustained discussion. This allows complex issues to be unpacked carefully, including the methodological ramifications of provenance research, the practical limits of what subject specialists can and cannot establish from the available evidence, and the ways in which their findings can be brought to bear on police action.

The extended format encourages detailed question-and-answer exchanges, in which finer points can be explored interactively rather than addressed superficially. These discussions often prompt critical reflection, challenge assumptions, and invite participants to contribute perspectives drawn from their own professional experience. For me, this combination of in-depth teaching and engaged dialogue is where much of the programme’s practical value lies.

As we look toward the 2026 program, which developments or emerging issues in the field of art crime do you consider particularly important, and how will these be reflected in your course?

One of the most alarming developments in the field is the growing use of digital technologies to fabricate or manipulate provenance documentation. These tools have significantly lowered the barrier to producing seemingly convincing ownership histories, making traditional forms of due diligence increasingly vulnerable to deception.

This development makes greater involvement of subject specialists – archaeologists, art historians – more pressing than ever. I see an increasing urgency to move beyond heavy reliance on circumstantial and document-based evidence and to strengthen analytical approaches based on evidence contained in the objects themselves. Stylistic and technical features, epigraphic and philological clues, iconography, material characteristics, the presence of dirt, wear, or alterations – all of these, and more, can provide trained specialists with robust indicators of recent illicit excavation at identifiable looting hotspots. Besides, objects should never be studied in isolation. It is vitally important to assess whether they form part of a broader pattern of material observable on the market.

In my course, I stress the need for methodological rigour in provenance research. Participants learn how experts can critically assess documentation, recognise the limits of paper trails, and understand how object-based analysis can provide concrete, defensible findings to help support investigations and enable law-enforcement action. This equips participants to identify old and new forms of deception in the antiquities trade. I will also argue that we need to expand and coordinate capacity to provide police with actionable specialist knowledge, often on short notice as objects are being detained for potential seizure. A new opportunity has arisen to build and harness this capacity sustainably, and this will be addressed in the course.

I will also remind participants that provenance research serves not only to support law enforcement in the recovery of objects, but also to safeguard associated historical data at risk of permanent loss. When specialists share knowledge without adequate reciprocity from the relevant authorities, valuable information is often lost unnecessarily – for example, data concerning other artefacts linked to the same suspect and thus potentially originating from the same archaeological locale. Failure to share information in both directions erases history, discourages specialist engagement, and undermines investigative opportunities. I have encountered multiple examples of this neglect.

The insistence of subject specialists on contextual knowledge may seem excessive, but law enforcement officers must understand that this information substantially enhances the evidentiary, historical, and cultural value of recovered artefacts – and that its loss is an avoidable calamity. Too often, police take for granted the support they receive from specialists, without acknowledging their own responsibility to help preserve clues about the contexts from which objects have been removed. This includes information about supply routes and other artefacts handled by the same actors. It is entirely understandable that professionals from different backgrounds may be blind to each other’s priorities, but this is precisely why sustained and thoughtful communication between these parties is so essential.

Last but not least, my course will demonstrate that enhanced scrutiny of the trade by subject specialists can help foster good practice in the market. When carefully managed, a public service for robust provenance research can establish a new benchmark for ethical trade, promoting higher standards of due diligence among sellers and buyers, and discouraging the circulation of illegally sourced objects. Proactive monitoring by specialists is crucial for ensuring accountability, benefiting all honest actors. Sellers and buyers can reduce their exposure to financial, reputational, and legal risks if they are willing to seek expert feedback in a transparent and auditable manner. To achieve this, we must improve the conditions that make such engagement possible.

What key skills, perspectives, or tools do you hope participants will gain from your course? In what ways can they apply these insights in their professional or academic paths?

The key aim is for subject specialists to recognise the vital role they must play in protecting cultural heritage from criminal exploitation. My course draws attention to a wide range of underused and overlooked methods and tools at their disposal. Academia remains a largely untapped resource in criminal investigations, yet specialists can make a crucial difference by providing law enforcement with reliable intelligence, based on thorough provenance research that only they are equipped to conduct.

The time when experts could conveniently distance themselves from the art market and its practices is over. For those who claim to be heritage professionals, turning a blind eye to heritage destruction is no longer an option. To suggest that this responsibility falls outside their daily duties or institutional remit is hardly justifiable. This sense of disconnect – or outright indifference – remains depressingly common, even in museums, the very institutions entrusted with safeguarding heritage. Such distancing not only fails to protect the past but also enables ongoing losses.

Through my course, participants gain not only the technical skills and analytical tools to assess an object’s archaeological origin and ownership history, but also the perspective and professional confidence to apply these tools responsibly. They learn how to turn their research into usable intelligence for law enforcement, inform prosecutions, and strengthen heritage protection, ensuring that their work has tangible impact both academically and in the real world.

If someone is considering applying to ARCA’s 2026 program, what advice would you give them? And why do you think now is a meaningful moment to engage with this field?

My advice to anyone considering participation in ARCA’s 2026 program is to be prepared to engage fully, not just with the material but with the ethical and practical dilemmas and challenges of protecting cultural heritage. Be ready to learn from experts across disciplines, to question assumptions, and to develop the skills and perspectives that will allow you to make a tangible difference in this field.

Now is a particularly critical moment to engage with the scourge of heritage crime. Around the world, cultural heritage is being destroyed and sold off on an unprecedented scale. There is a pressing need for more people to organise and tackle this problem effectively. The challenges are evolving, as new technologies make illicit practices increasingly sophisticated. Yet the tools, methodologies, and collaborative frameworks available to confront heritage crime are now also more robust than ever. There has never been a more suitable time for well-intentioned specialists to apply their expertise responsibly and make a real-world impact. And ARCA’s program provides the ideal foundation for those seeking to build a career in this field.

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📌 ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Programmes (Italy | Summer 2026)

• Post Lauream I (22 May – 23 June 2026): PG Cert in Art & Antiquities Crime

• Post Lauream II (26 June – 26 July 2026): PG Cert in Provenance, Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property

➡️ Take one track—or combine both in a single summer.

Meet Our Alumni: ARCA PG Cert Spotlight Series — Aubrey Catrone, Provenance Researcher and ARCA Alumna

2025-12-30T22:26:00.002+01:00

Welcome to ARCA’s PG Cert Alumni Spotlight Series, a collection of in-depth Q&A interviews conducted by Edgar Tijhuis*, highlighting the professional journeys, achievements, and ongoing contributions of graduates from ARCA’s Postgraduate Certificate Programs in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection. Through these conversations, we aim to showcase the diverse paths our alumni have taken—across academia, law enforcement, museums, research, policy, and the cultural heritage sector—and to share the insights, motivations, and experiences that continue to shape their work in safeguarding the world’s shared artistic legacy.

What motivated you to enroll in ARCA’s Postgraduate Program?

From a young age, I was very passionate about art history and history in general. I believed, and continue to believe, that every work of art has a story to tell. And that story is rooted in an object’s unique history.

As an undergraduate, I really had no idea how to turn this passion into a career. That is until the field of provenance research captured my attention - the perfect avenue through which to marry my interests. And it was the discovery of the ARCA post graduate program that I knew would help me turn my passion into professional practicality.

Can you describe a moment in the program that had a lasting impact on you—personally or professionally?

When my class visited the Etruscan necropolis of Cerveteri, we saw evidence of looted tombs and pottery fragments strewn across the forest floor. This gave a chilling context to the laundering of art objects that have been ripped from their original locations and later emerge on the fine art market. And, it reinforced my passion for ensuring that art objects traverse the art market with a correct and complete biography.

What was your favorite course or topic, and why did it stand out?

While not a course when I originally took the course in 2015, but Marc Masurovsky’s provenance course has become a favorite of mine. Marc’s experience in the field is unparalleled. And, he fosters lively discussions where students can explore the intricacies of issues that are often reduced to a bulleted list of names.

How did the international nature of the program influence your learning experience?

The international nature of the program exposes students to a myriad of professional and cultural backgrounds. From those who have managed cultural heritage sites to law enforcement to auction house representatives, ARCA undermines the “victimless” crime narrative, exposing students to the myriad perspectives and long-lasting effects of art and cultural heritage crime.

Did the program change or shape your career path?

Absolutely! I entered the ARCA Program seeking to better understand how I could enter the world of provenance research. During the program, I was exposed to foundational knowledge that I continue to use in my day-to-day practice. ARCA also introduced me to a community of professionals that helped shape my career path after the program. For example, I found volunteer and internship opportunities through the ARCA networking community. I am also still close with many of my classmates, even working with some on a regular basis, over ten years later.

What was it like to live and study in Amelia, Italy?

Given the location and size of the town, Amelia offered the perfect environment to live and breathe art crime while also fully immersing myself in a traditional Italian lifestyle.

What advice would you give to someone considering applying for the 2026 programs?

In my opinion, ARCA is the most practical post-graduate program focusing on art crime and cultural heritage protection available. All classes are taught by experience professionals with real-life experience in their course topics. For example, students learn how to identify and investigate red flags in provenance entries from experts who have worked on actual restitution and repatriation cases.

My advice here is to use this exposure to your advantage. The professors are in Amelia to share their knowledge and help train professionals who will advance ARCA’s missions. So - questions, network, and absorb what you can.

How has your understanding of art crime evolved since completing the program?

ARCA helped build the foundations of my understanding of art crime beyond the most well-known sensational cases or films. This is not entirely a world of smash and grab antics like most recently exhibited at the Louvre. In many cases that I work on, we are dealing with questions of fraud, misrepresentation, or lack of documentation. These are often crimes of opportunity that happen at all levels of the art market.

In one sentence: why should someone join ARCA's program?

ARCA welcomes attendees to a community that extends beyond the historic walls of Amelia in its pursuit to advance art crime and cultural heritage protection literacy.

About Aubrey Catrone

Aubrey Catrone is an art historian, appraiser, and provenance researcher. Aubrey earned an MA in the History of Art from University College London, specializing in the documented histories of art objects. With an art gallery and academic research background, Catrone founded Proper Provenance, LLC to provide her clients with the tools, not only to historically contextualize art, but also to shed light on attribution and legal title within the international art market. She is an Accredited Member of the Appraisers Association of America with a specialization in Impressionist & Modern Art.

Catrone has researched artworks including paintings, works on paper, prints, and sculptures spanning Old Masters to Ultra Contemporary. She has appeared as a guest expert on the History Channel and published her scholarship in a variety of publications including RICS Journals and the Journal of Art Crime.

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📌 ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Programmes (Italy | Summer 2026)

• Post Lauream I (22 May – 23 June 2026): PG Cert in Art & Antiquities Crime

• Post Lauream II (26 June – 26 July 2026): PG Cert in Provenance, Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property

➡️ Take one track—or combine both in a single summer.

Interview with Professor Saskia Hufnagel: Cultural Heritage Law, Art Crime, and the ARCA Experience

2025-12-28T08:48:00.003+01:00

As part of ARCA’s ongoing effort to give prospective participants a deeper look behind the scenes of our Postgraduate Certificate Programmes in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection, Edgar Tijhuis* speaks with our faculty members about their work, their motivations, and the unique learning environment we create each summer in Italy.

This series aims to offer future participants a personal glimpse into the people who teach with ARCA, the community around it, and what to expect in the coming year.

Saskia Hufnagel

To begin, could you tell us a bit about yourself?

I started off as a German Criminal Lawyer in a little town close to the Dutch border and had nothing to do with art at all. In my practice I got very interested in cross-border crime and law enforcement dealing with it and was very lucky to receive a scholarship funded jointly by the European Commission and the Australian National University to pursue a PhD in the area of international law enforcement cooperation.

After my PhD I spent some time as a researcher in Queensland and one of my PhD examiners who had regularly participated in ARCA events, Prof Duncan Chappell, encouraged me to write with him on the Beltracci case.

That was my first time at ARCA in 2011 and I loved both the research and the people very much. So much so, that I decided to combine my research areas of policing and transnational crime with art and antiquities and to establish myself in this new research field.

I then moved to Queen Mary University of London to teach criminal law, policing and comparative criminal justice, but kept working with Prof Duncan Chappell. In 2016 we were awarded an AHRC Network Grant and started bringing people together who worked on art crime all over the world, including many from the ARCA community. In 2023 I was offered a Professorship in Australia and am now teaching and researching at the University of Sydney Law School. I am still fascinated by art crime and am researching and writing on it, in particular on art and money laundering.

In 2024 Lynda Albertson and Edgar Tijhuis asked me to teach on the ARCA programme and I was absolutely delighted to do so. Teaching on the programme is a wonderful experience and for me the highlight of the year!

You have been part of ARCA’s community for some time. Have attended the annual Amelia Art Crime Conference?

In the past 14 years, I have only missed two ARCA conferences and the time in Amelia each year is extremely important for my research as it is inspiring and envigorating, creating new contacts with wonderful people in the field and bringing me up to date with the newest research. There are so many memorable moments from these conferences, but the first conference I attended was really the one that changed my career, inspired me to keep working in the field and initiated friendships that have lasted now for many years (though new ones can be added to the list each year!).

From your perspective, what makes ARCA’s Postgraduate Certificate Program truly unique and valuable?

There is no other program like ARCA. University programs will situate a course mainly within one discipline, so you rarely get the same variety of interdisciplinary knowledge taught within this program elsewhere. Also, ARCA has contacts to some of the most knowledgeable academics and practitioners in the field and brings them together from all around the world to teach the programme.

How does the location in Italy — surrounded by centuries of cultural heritage — enhance the learning experience for participants?

The vibe of the location is very conducive to learning about art and antiquity crime. You see the tomb raiders hang out around the Etruscan tombs that you will be visiting and the taught becomes real. The threat to culture and the importance of preserving it are felt as particularly pressing in this environment. The beauty of the nature and the quality of food and wine obviously also help to bring the student community together and make it an unforgettable experience.

Are there particular site visits or practical elements during your course that you find especially valuable?

My course is pretty dull as law is often not that exciting and I am teaching the law around cultural heritage and the basics of criminal law, property law and international law. I try to make up for the technicalities by using a fair amount of pictures in my slides and doing very interactive classes where students learn by asking questions and engaging with me rather than by having to listen to me droning on about the law. There will still be a bit of that, but I try to keep it as ‘fun’ as possible.

As we look toward the 2026 program, which developments or emerging issues in the field of art crime do you consider particularly important, and how will these be reflected in your course?

2025 was obviously dominated by the Louvre heist and there is a lot one can learn from this case in terms of criminal law, but also international law and policing. This is obviously just one case and many other events have marjorly impacted cultural property protection in recent years, such as the wars in Ukraine and other parts of the world, making us think about import and export bans and how to enforce them. We will use current examples to explain the law and think about the complexity of the law. How many criminal offence were, for example, committed during the Louvre heist?

What key skills, perspectives, or tools do you hope participants will gain from your course? In what ways can they apply these insights in their professional or academic paths?

The law around cultural heritage/property is important for all areas of art crime research. I hope that students get an understanding of the basics of the law surrounding it to be able to understand, for example, why some moral obligations might not be legal obligations and to see the legal restraints around restitution as well as civil and criminal trials more generally. An understanding of the law is important whether you are a police officer or a gallerist. It sets the parameters within which eiter can move and do business and should be of interest to everyone.

If someone is considering applying to ARCA’s 2026 program, what advice would you give them? And why do you think now is a meaningful moment to engage with this field?

Amelia is a once in a lifetime opportunity to study with a very diverse group of students, people you would otherwise never – or not very likely – meet in your life. Make friends, support each other studying, have fun, enjoy the wide variety of teachers and subjects and take home a great deal of knowledge and a new little family. Art and antiquities crime is a very important field of research but still not many people know about it. Your mission is to change this and get the knowledge you gain at ARCA out into the world. Make people care.

About Saskia Hufnagel

Dr Saskia Hufnagel is a Professor at the University of Sydney Law School. Her research focuses on art crime, transnational and comparative criminal justice and global law enforcement cooperation. Her particular interests are the detection, investigation and prosecution of art crimes in the UK, Germany and Australia from a comparative legal perspective and international and regional legal patterns of cross-border policing. Saskia is a qualified German legal professional and accredited specialist in criminal law. She holds an LL.B. from the University of Trier and an LL.M. as well as a PhD from the Australian National University.

After completing her PhD she worked at the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security, Griffith University, Australia, and was a Leverhulme Fellow at the University of Leeds. Before joining the University of Sydney she worked for nine years at Queen Mary University of London, teaching ‘Criminal Law’, ‘Art, Business and Law’, ‘Policing’ and ‘Comparative Criminal Justice’. Her publications in the field of art crime include the “Palgrave Handbook of Art Crime” (S. Hufnagel and D. Chappell, eds.) (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019); ‘Anti-Money Laundering Regulation and the Art Market’ (with Colin King) (2020) 40(1) Legal Studies and many other edited collections, articles and book chapters.

* Dr Edgar Tijhuis is Academic Director at ARCA and is responsible for coordinating ARCA’s postgraduate certificate programmes. Since 2009, he has also taught criminology modules within ARCA's PG Certificate programmes. To apply for the 2026 programmes, request a prospectus via the email below or contact Edgar Tijhuis for other questions.

📌 ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Programmes (Italy | Summer 2026)

• Post Lauream I (22 May – 23 June 2026): PG Cert in Art & Antiquities Crime

• Post Lauream II (26 June – 26 July 2026): PG Cert in Provenance, Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property

➡️ Take one track—or combine both in a single summer.

A Case Study in Patience: The Long Journey Home for the Stela of Adad-nerari III

2025-12-23T12:07:00.028+01:00

Back in the Spring of 2014, the art world found itself drawn to a particularly controversial object slated to come up for auction in Bonhams April's Antiquities sale in London. The piece was the lower two-thirds of a monumental black basalt stela which depicts an Assyrian king in a long-fringed cloak, holding his staff, surrounded by divine symbols. Incised across his body were twenty lines of evenly-spaced cuneiform script, with more text spilling over the sculpture's left side.

Listed as "a monumental Neo-Assyrian black basalt royal stele of Adad-nerari III of Assyria" the artefact was given an estimated sale price of between £600,000 to £800,000.

One inscription, carved with deliberate precision millennia ago, warned of divine retribution against anyone who uprooted the monument from its sacred setting. The irony was hard to miss: an ancient warning against plunder carried on a fragment plainly removed from its own archaeological context, its journey into the modern market underscoring that loss of context, while standing as evidence that plunder continues to drive today’s illicit antiquities trade, hidden by vague statements of ownership that try, and fail, to hide its true origins.

What made this sale contentious was not its dramatic epigraphy, but the serious questions raised about where and to whom this Assyrian piece could be traced. The stele in question dates to the reign of Adad-nīrārī III, King of Assyria from 811 to 783 BCE, a ruler whose period marked both consolidation and transition within the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Ascending the throne as a child, he initially ruled under the regency of his mother, the formidable Queen Šammuramat, often identified with the later Semiramis of classical legend.

Once in power, Adad-nīrārī III launched military campaigns across the Levant, extracting tribute from a wide arc of subject kingdoms and helping to reassert Assyria’s dominance after a period of instability. His inscriptions frequently emphasise divine sanction, royal piety and the restoration of order, themes that appear on the complete stela from which this fragment was once part. Objects bearing his name are valuable not only for their artistic and epigraphic qualities but also because they help us define and understand the extent of Assyria’s political reach under his rule.

Consigned to Bonhams through an intermediary, the stela would ultimately be traced by law enforcement to the then-Geneva-based Lebanese antiquities dealer Halim Korban. For those familiar with major art crime cases, his name may resonate for his involvement in the sale of the controversial Sevso Silver, the spectacular, but looted hoard of fourth-century Roman silver sold to the Marquess of Northampton and ultimately restituted to the Hungarian government in 2014.

Without any paperwork to substantiate how it left its country of origin and came into the possession of Korban, the Assyrian artefact was listed for auction with a simple but vague claim that the owner's father gifted him the ancient object "in the 1960s."

Archaeologists and art historians traced the find spot for the piece to the upper portion of the stela from ancient Du¯r-Katlimmu, modern Tell Sheikh Hamad in eastern Syria, on the lower Khabur River (Deir ez-Zor Governorate). That top portion was hauled away by Hormuzd Rassam, who visited the site in May 1879 during an expedition on behalf of the British Museum. Too heavy to transport across great distances, the controversial Assyriologist wrote:

"had great difficulty to move to the sea-coast what remained of the Assyrian sculpture, because it was too large to carry on horseback; and when we came to thin it, as I had taken some tools with me for the purpose, it was found too hard to cut."

Eventually Rassam returned to England with a hacked-down, and significantly mutilated version of the upper portion of Adad-nīrārī's famous stela which has been housed in the British Museum's collection (inventory number: BM 131124) since 1881. While the explorer wanted to return to Syria to seek out the lower portion, Rassam was never granted permission to do so, and it is unclear how or when the lower portion was discovered and ultimately removed from the country without permission.

What we do know with certainty is that the lower portion of the stela first came to public notice in June of 2000 when it was consigned to Christie’s in New York. Offered as Lot 491, but mistakenly attributed to S ˇamsˇı¯-Adad V of Assyria, the memorial stela remained unsold and was shipped back to Geneva after the failed auction.

Luckily, the stela was not forgotten. Colour photographs published in the Christie's auction's Sale 9380 catalogue detailed the stela fragment's front and side inscriptions. This in turn allowed Austrian Assyriologist Karen Radner, to study and reconstruct its historical context.

In the summer of 2012 Korbane contacted Dr. Jonathan Taylor who worked with the Cuneiform Collections in the Department of the Middle East at the British Museum hoping to broker a sale that never occurred. Taylor in turn put the Lebanese dealer in touch with Radner who viewed the Geneva piece on 1 November 2012 and the British Museum piece on 16 November 2012. Convinced that the two pieces matched definitively, Radner thanked both Taylor and the owner of the Geneva fragment, who wished to remain anonymous, in her article, The stele of Adad-nērārī III and Nergal-ēreš from Dūr-Katlimmu (Tell Šaiḫ Ḥamad) . Published in 2012 in Altorientalische Forschungen, an academic journal in the fields of ancient Near Eastern studies her article formally outlined her findings regarding the match between the two pieces.

With no takers at the British Museum, the 2.1 metres tall stone memorial was back on offer at Bonhams in 2014 when, over mounting uproar, an urgent letter was addressed to Dr. Maamooun Abkulkarem, then Director-General of Antiquities and Museums (DGAM) in Syria’s Ministry of Culture, from a correspondent in Berlin. That letter arrived at the DGAM on 23 March 2014, and the artefact was subsequently pulled from auction on 31 March 2014, to be held as evidence by the Metropolitan Police in London as it was believed that the stela was looted from Tell Sheikh Hamad on/around 1999.

A year and a half after its seizure in London, another colourful Geneva-based diamond broker Emile Chayto was charged with fraud for falsely representing the provenance of the stela to disguise its theft and illegal export from Syria. One can speculate that Korban’s name had been intentionally omitted, as his name would have been an immediate red flag given the recent restitution of the Sevso treasure the same year of the auction.

In 2017, digging in his heels, the purveyor of the pilfered stela sued the Metropolitan Police's Commissioner, Bernard Hogan-Howe, in London for the artefact's return, even demanding £200,000 in compensation for alleged loss and damages. As the case moved from British to Swiss courts, Korban clung to a rather fanciful tale that the 930-kilogram monument had been in his family's hands since the 1930s and was brought to Switzerland in 1958 and then left for decades under a tarpaulin in his garden until he realised it might be worth something.

Despite his confidence, the dealer produced zero evidence to support this narrative, and the stela’s remarkably fine state of preservation suggested it had not spent half a century weathering the elements of a Western European backyard. Ultimately, following a multi-year investigation and examination by four other scholars, the Swiss Public Prosecutor’s Office concluded that the stele, by then sent back to Switzerland, was the product of illegal looting and ordered its restitution to the Republic of Syria.

This decision was upheld by the Court of Justice of the Canton of Geneva in a ruling published on 21 June 2024 noting that the decision taken in the lower court had relied on the concurring opinions of the four experts to conclude that the stela had been looted from Syria. This week the weighty memorial was transferred to the storage facility of the Swiss Federal Office of Culture, who is working on its transfer to the Republic of Syria in coordination with the Syrian authorities.

For the time being, a date of its return has not yet been announced, but the story of this Assyrian stele illustrates how even objects with colourful legends can sit at the heart of serious debates about the ethics of the contemporary antiquities trade. One of the most prominent being that two major auction houses didn't shy away from accepting this high value piece, no matter how poorly documented its legal origin had been and despite a growing legal framework that prioritises returning artefacts to their countries of origin when credible evidence of illicit transfer exists.

While this stela fragment’s return is now guaranteed, its legacy endures as a cautionary tale and a reminder that the market’s “curse” is not a supernatural hex etched into the stone honouring a long dead king, but the industry’s ongoing refusal to confront its legal and ethical responsibilities. Understanding provenance and respecting the rights of source communities are not optional flourishes but essential obligations. If the art market is to move beyond a profit-for-profit’s-sake model, it must embrace ethical dealing as a core practice rather than an inconvenience. Only then can art collecting and dealing claim a role in safeguarding, rather than exploiting, the world’s shared cultural heritage.

Meet our Alumni — ARCA PG Cert Spotlight Series: Sue Berryman

2025-12-20T09:30:00.004+01:00

Sue Berryman

What motivated you to enroll in ARCA’s Program?

My husband collapsed and died in March 2018. I was 80 years old at the time, but I was still working a lot as a consultant to the World Bank where I had been employed before retiring. I decided that this was an optimum time to pivot. What did I want to do? Professionally I was an economist. But I loved to write, I loved art, and I loved detection and crime. So, I thought: “I’ll write art crime novels”--knowing nothing about art crime. I stumbled on the ARCA program by accident and saw that it would give me exactly the training that I needed.

Can you describe a moment in the program that had a lasting impact on you?

This is a hard question!! There were so many experiences that had a lasting impact. Modules of the program; faculty; my (much younger) and lovely fellow students; the superb CEO of ARCA, Lynda Albertson; Amelia itself.

Sue Berryman during the Museum Security Course
What was your favorite course or topic, and why did it stand out?

Again, a hard question! Several modules were standouts: the module on real-world art crime from the perspective of a retired Inspector of Scotland Yard's Art & Antiques Unit; the module on museum security with a real-world security “stealth” audit in Rome; the units on variations in and nuances of art law; art insurance; the courses on looting of art (including, but not exclusively, Nazi looting).

How did the international nature of the program influence your learning experience?

Art and art crime are inherently international. Looted items cross oceans and countries, for example. A faculty and fellow students from multiple countries not only fit the nature of art crime, but gave us multiple perspectives on the issues.

Were you able to use insights from your own career in the ARCA program?

Absolutely! I attended ARCA in 2019, and, of course, countries and then virtually the world shut down for two years because of COVID. During the US shutdown, although I was alone, I was never lonely. I wrote two art crime books and a few lengthy vignettes to be integrated into a third book. So much of my writing was based on what I had learned in the ARCA program. ARCA gave me the fuel to create and prosper, despite the shutdown.

What was it like to live and study in Amelia, Italy?

Absolutely fabulous, though HOT in the summer. The wonderful CEO of ARCA made sure that we knew of local festivals, such as a religious procession where the townspeople decorated the sidewalks, using flour, ground coffee, fresh flower petals, and small pieces of colored paper to create designs. The piece de resistance, however, was the Palio dei Colombi. This is not a horse race like Siena's, but a historic medieval festival (rievocazione storica) held annually, celebrating Amelia's patron saint, St. Fermina, featuring crossbow contests (Balestrieri), parades with flag-wavers, historical costumes, and friendly rivalry between Amelia's historic districts (Contrade) for the coveted 'Colombi' (Doves) banner. Authentic and incredible.

Can you share a memorable interaction you had with faculty, guest speakers, or fellow students?

Again, there were so many!

· The retired head of Scotland Yard’s Art and Antiquities squad had described in class the identification, arrest, and trial of a Brit who had smuggled numerous looted Egyptian antiquities into the UK, many coated in resin and painted to look like tourist trash.

· Our professor for art insurance divided the class into teams and asked us to create an art insurance skit, using our new knowledge to settle the claim. Someone on my team got the brilliant idea of a conceptual piece of art displayed at a local museum: dust bunnies artfully arranged that the daily cleaner thought were ordinary dirt and vacuumed up. I was useless at my team’s presentation because I was laughing so hard.

· On a very hot day, we tumbled like puppies out of our classroom in the cloister of the Church of St. Francis Assisi, heading for our beloved gelato shop to buy gallons of cooling lemon sorbet made from lemons from Naples the size of grapefruit.

· During the Palio festival, we ate at pop up restaurants all over town and walked out on an outcropping of Amelia’s hill to absorb the views of the surrounding countryside with a full moon rising.

· Again, during the Palio festival, we watched the long procession of townspeople dressed in beautifully made medieval costumes walk solemnly down the main street to the beating of drums.

What advice would you give to someone considering applying for the 2026 session?

This is a serious and high quality program with excellent standards. You work hard—readings, class presentations (papers, skits), short papers, and a longer paper due about two months after the end of the program. But, as with everything in life, if you invest focus and time, you get so much back. And all of this occurs in an in an enchanting country and in an enchanting Umbrian hill town that dates to the Etruscans. The head of the program is incredible. Yes, she expects us to work, but she ensures that we have fun and take advantage of being in a splendid part of the world.

How has your understanding of art crime evolved since completing the program?

My understanding of art crime has shot past headline stories such as the latest Louvre heist. It is substantially more complex and nuanced. The art world is Janus-faced. We all know the face of sublime human artistic achievement on one side. But on the other side, it is a poxy tart. Greed, revenge, moral shortcuts, all disguised by the rarified atmosphere of great art and exclusive transactions in the art market.

In one sentence: why should someone join ARCA's program?

This was the most profound experience of my life. If you want to learn about complexities of art crime (endlessly fascinating) and want unforgettable memories, JUST GO! You will never, never regret it.

About Sue Berryman

Dr. Sue Berryman taught at the Harvard Business School, worked as a senior analyst at the RAND Corporation, directed the Institute on Education and the Economy at Columbia University, and worked with the technical team of the World Bank. In her last few years, she has been writing art crime novels based on the wealth of learning facilitated by the ARCA Program.

* Dr Edgar Tijhuis is Academic Director at ARCA and is responsible for coordinating ARCA’s postgraduate certificate programmes. Since 2009, he has also taught criminology modules within ARCA's PG Certification programming.