By Edgar Tijhuis*
This year, ARCA’s Post Lauream I on Art and Antiquities Crime will be held from 23 May through 20 July 2025, followed by ARCA’s Post Lauream II in Acquisition & Interpretation of Cultural Property. Both programs can be taken separately or together and are held in the beautiful heart of Umbria in Amelia, Italy.
In the months leading up to the start of the programmes, this year’s lecturers are being interviewed about their courses and teaching with ARCA in Italy. In this interview we meet Dorit Straus, who is a specialist in art insurance and an independent art and insurance advisor. Previously, Dorit Straus was Vice President and Worldwide Specialty Fine Art Manager for Chubb & Son, a division of Federal Insurance Company and member of the Board of Directors of AXA Art Americas Corporation.
Can you tell us something about your background?
I am originally from Israel - I come from a musical family- my father was from Vienna and was a child prodigy studying violin with the great violinist Bronislaw Huberman. When the Nazis came to power Bronislaw Huberman in 1936 founded what is today the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and brought some of the best musicians from Europe to what was then the British controlled Mandatory Palestine - my father was among those musicians that Huberman saved and brought to the orchestra.
All told Huberman saved over 1000 musicians and their families from the Nazis. My father met my mother in Israel because her three brothers were also in the orchestra, and my father became the concertmaster of the orchestra, so my childhood was full of music and I met many of the most famous musicians who came to perform in Israel.
I used to go to concerts and take my autograph book with me - I have autographs from musicians like Arthur Rubenstein, Leonard Bernstein, Igor Stravinsky, Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich, Pablo Casals, and many many more. Although I studied piano and still play today, mostly chamber music, I pursued a different vocation - I studied Middle Eastern archeology at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and participated in digs at Hazor with professor Yigael Yadin noted for his work on the Dead Sea Scrolls and the excavations conducted at the Judean desert rock-fortress of Masada.
I came to the US in 1970 and worked at several museums including the Jewish Museum in NY and the Peabody Museum of ethnology at Harvard University at Cambridge Mass. Some years later I switched to a business career with Chubb group of Insurance companies where I trained as a property and casualty underwriter Although Chubb did insure fine art, at the time there was no specialisation in that area, so eventually I created a Fine Art specialty within the company, as well as a special program for museums and cultural institutions.
And how did you get involved with ARCA?
I came to the attention of Noah Charney who was organising a conference at Cambridge University about art and crime as an academic subject and he invited me to speak, which I did. Some years later when he created ARCA's in person training programming, he invited me to come and teach a course about art and crime and its implications for the insurance industry and I have been teaching this course for over 12 years now.
What is the purpose of the course you are teaching this summer?
Many private art collectors and museums are insured - while many are not - in either case there are so many misconceptions about how insurance is purchased, what is covered and what isn't etc. The purpose of the course is to explain the whole process through actual case studies and show how the insurance industry is a major participant working in the art trade.
Any advice for the participants in your course?
At least in my course, I like to have heavy class participation - I realise that most people don't have any experience in insurance and so I tell everyone that there are no stupid questions.
What is special about ARCA's programmes?
ARCA offers an opportunity to learn from real practitioners in the art world about their area of expertise. Small class size allows for meaningful discussion and networking. Also the participants come from all over the world and this affords more opportunities for different world views, as well as consensus building about the issues in are important within the art world.
What is it like in Amelia?
Amelia is a charming picturesque town perched up in the hills surrounded by Neolithic walls. It's quiet and very restful, away from the hustle bustle of big cities like Rome - yet its within an easy train ride to Rome and by car to other important towns like Assisi, Orvieto, Perugia, etc..
Which course would you like to follow yourself?
Marc Masurovsky's Provenance course is definitely one that I am interested in.
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NB: Late Applications are being accepted for both summer programs. For a detailed prospectus and application materials or for general questions about this postgraduate program please contact us at: programmes [at] artcrimeresearch.org
*Edgar Tijhuis serves as the Academic Director at ARCA. He is responsible for the postgraduate certificate program and has taught criminology modules within the ARCA program since ARCA’s start in 2009.
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