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Showing posts with label Amelia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Amelia. Show all posts

June 19, 2014

Report from ARCA Amelia '14: Second week of courses by Flynn and Ellis bookended with visit to Orvieto

The end of Dr. Flynn's class.  Photo by Summer Kelley-Bell
By Camille Knop, ARCA '14 Intern

Professor Tom Flynn’s course, ‘The International Art Market and Associated Risk’, resumed last Monday with discussions on the tensions between the aesthetic and economic values of works of art. The class concluded two days later with the screening of Furcht, a 1917 German Expressionist film written and directed by Robert Wiene that explores the colonialist roots of collections and the magical haptic quality of works of art that moves one to possess them (even at the risk of one’s safety, in this case). In order to fulfill the course requirements, students composed a 1,500-word response to Gregory Day’s article, “Explaining the Art Market Thefts, Frauds, and Forgeries (And Why the Art Market Does Not Seem to Care).” This exercise allowed students to synthesize and expand on the consequences of the logic of art when put at odds (or not) with the logic of capital.

The End of Dick Ellis' class. Photo by Summer Kelley-Bell

Professor Dick Ellis’ course (“Art Policing, Protection, and Investigating”) the second half of the week included student presentations on art-related crime, focusing on issues regarding due diligence, motivations, and legal and jurisdictional frameworks. Cases ranged from paintings stolen from private property, to an Egyptian pectoral stolen from a university library, to manuscripts smuggled out of Mali, to underwater archaeological looting. The weekend began with many students joining Professor Ellis at two local spots in Amelia: Bar Leonardi and Bar Vertigo.

Despite the forecast of heavy rain, students enjoyed various weekend activities without the stress of any coursework. On Saturday morning, a small group of eight went on an optional trip to Orvieto, which rests on a small plateau of volcanic tuff. After arriving at the foot of the city by bus at around 9:00 a.m., they enjoyed a ride up the funicular that took them right to the edge of the city walls. While some students visited a Roman double-helix well, others wandered around the city, which was preparing for an annual festival that afternoon. Eventually, everyone reunited in the Duomo di Orvieto, whose impressive exterior decoration drew them in like flies to bright lights. Luckily, the group left minutes before a large thunderstorm, which had been seen making its way through the valley towards the city.

Duomo di Orvieto. Photo by Summer Kelley-Bell
By the end of the second week of the ARCA program, the initial nervous excitement of orientation and move-in had worn off, and students began to feel more comfortable as they established their daily routines. In my case, the owners of Caffe Grande, concerned with my poor Italian, have been helping me expand my vocabulary from simply “Grazie!” and “Ciao!” by teaching me alternative greetings through some very animated gestures and universal sign language. Although I was not yet prepared to help a lady who had asked me for directions that week, I was still ecstatic over the fact that I had even been asked! By the end of the second week of classes, ARCA students, including myself, have begun to feel (and apparently appear) less like newcomers and more like Amerini.

You may read about the first week of the program here.

June 12, 2014

Report from ARCA Amelia '14: Inside the lecture hall, Dick Ellis on art investigations and Tom Flynn on the art market; outside: students explore Narni and Amelia

by Paula Carretero, ARCA '14 Intern

Friday, June 30th marked the official start of the 2014 Graduate Certificate Program in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection, with the arrival of the students to Italy. Students managed to arrive and find their way from Rome to Amelia after navigating the occasionally chaotic Italian transport infrastructure. The bus strike going on that day for sure made it interesting for the students, but everyone arrived safely to the welcome cocktail at La Locanda del Conte Nitto , one of the restaurants in town that, friendly as always, took in all the ARCA students as a welcome to the start of the summer. Over the weekend, students started exploring the city and guided tours were organized during which some of the city’s most wonderful corners were discovered. Among them, students walked into the centro storico of the town, wandering through the medieval streets and exploring some wonderful places: such as the Duomo, the Roman cisterns, and the Teatro Sociale
"Interns in the Cisterns" by Camille Knop

Week one of classes started with Dr. Tom Flynn, a RICS-Accredited Art Market and Art Appraisal lecturer at Kingston University in London.  His course in this year's program was “The International Art Market and Associated Risk.” Though the first half of the week, students explored the history and evolution of the art market; how early collections were gathered in the Cabinets of curiosities (also known as Kunstkabinett, Kunstkammer, Wunderkammer, Cabinets of Wonder, and wonder-rooms); the mechanisms of auctions houses, dealers and collectors; and issues on the value of art. The vast experience of Dr. Flynn, and the relaxed atmosphere in class, helped in creating interesting debates that were enriched by the multiple backgrounds of students from all over the world.

Dick Ellis took over the second half of the week with the course on “Art Policing, Protection and Investigating.” The founder of Scotland Yard’s Art & Antiquities squad introduced the students to the world of art theft, covert operations, money laundering using art, and the mechanism of organized crime as well as thieves motivations to steal art. By the end of the week, students were blown away by the vast experience of Professor Ellis and his generosity in sharing his wisdom with the class.

View from the top of Narni (Photo by 
ARCA Intern Camille Knop)
After this first week full of activities, and with the students’ heads full of plenty of new and valuable knowledge, a well-deserved weekend break arrived. Some of the students, using their remaining energy, took part in a trip to Narni on Saturday, a nearby town. The students enjoyed discovering and walking around the medieval-like streets of the town and went to visit some of the most important monuments like Rocca Albornoz, a 14th century fortress that became the home of popes and cardinals. In Subterranean Narni, the guided tour included the old convent of San Domenico, ancient Roman water tanks, prison cells used during the Inquisition, and 12th century frescoes in a medieval church (here's a link to an article on archaeologist Robert Nini who discovered the former Benedictine abbey in 1979 through an entrance from an old man's garden).

The ones who stayed in Amelia did not miss the chance to explore in their own way. Some of them went to the movie club organized at Chiostro Boccarini each weekend and started getting to know and interact with the Amerini, the citizens of Amelia, to confirm that they are as friendly as their reputation says. Finally, and to help fight the hot temperatures that are starting to arrive, some of the students spent some time hanging out around the pool house and recovering energy for the upcoming weeks. Summer has just arrived and courses are just beginning, but many other adventures are yet to come.

January 30, 2014

ARCA'13 Alum Summer Kelley-Bell asks: Is this the program for you? Really now.

A medieval town & its secret passageways
by Summer Kelley-Bell, ARCA 2013

WARNING: this essay is a work of satire.  It will be best understood if read in the voice of the Dowager Countess of Grantham, from Downton Abbey.

As an ARCA alumna, I have come to warn you about all of the things that you will hate about this small program on art crime. In that vein, I here offer you a list of the woes of living in a small Umbrian town the likes of which will keep you up at night as you scroll through old Facebook photos.  A letter of warning, if you will, to all prospective ARCA-ites. Should you choose to ignore my advice, I cannot be responsible for the consequences.

Your first few days in Amelia will leave you with an intense urge to explore and make friends.  The town is ancient, surrounded on most sides by a Neolithic wall with even more history buried beneath it.  There are secret passages and hidden rooms and you’re going to want to grab a new-found buddy and sneak through every one of them.  DON’T.  The more you explore, the more you will love the town, and it will make it that much harder to leave.  Yes, there is a secret Roman cellar underneath one of the restaurants.  Yes, the town’s people do scatter the roads with rose petals in the shape of angels every June.  Yes, there quite possibly is a hidden room in your classmate's flat.  All of these things are beside the point.  Walk steady on the path and avoid all temptations to adventure.

As for friends, stick with people that live near to you back in the real world.  I know Papa di Stefano is fantastic, and yes, he will befriend you in a way that transcends language, but do you really want to miss him when you’ve gone?  And your fellow students?  Well, most of them are going to live nowhere near you.  Do you really need to have contacts in Lisbon and Melbourne and New York and Amsterdam?  No, you don’t.  It’s so damp in the Netherlands and we all know London is just atrocious.  I mean really, all those people. Take my advice, ignore anyone that lives far away from you.  You are here to learn and leave, not make connections that will last you the rest of forever.

You will also want to avoid the town’s locals.  Amelia is tiny, so getting to know most of its shopkeepers and inhabitants will not be very hard, but you must resist the urge to do so.  It’s true that Massimo will know your coffee order before you get fully through his door, and the Count will open his home with a smile to show you around his gorgeous palazzo, but these things are not proper.  Do not mistake their overflowing kindness and warmth for anything other than good breeding.  And when you find yourself sobbing at the thought of saying goodbye to Monica, you can just blame your tears on the pollen like the rest of us.

Your instructors are going to be just as big of a challenge.  The professor’s are really too friendly.  I know that Noah Charney says that he’s available for lunch and Dick Ellis will happily have a beer with you, but is getting to know your professor socially really appropriate?  I mean, we’ve all attended seminars where you barely see the speaker outside of stolen moments during coffee breaks, and that’s the best way for things to go, isn’t it?  Sterile classroom experience with little to no professorial interactions is the way academic things should run.  I know I never saw any of my professor’s outside of class.  And I certainly don’t keep up with Judge Tompkin’s travels through his hilarious emails; that would just be inappropriate.

And then there’s the conference.  It lasts an entire weekend.  Why would I want to attend a weekend long event where powerhouses in the field open up their brains for poor plebeians?  I mean honestly, meeting Christos Tsirogiannis at the conference will be a high point in your year, and it will be too difficult to control your nerdy spasms when Toby Bull sits down next to you at dinner.  And then, when you find out that Christos joined ARCA's teaching team in 2014 and you’ll find yourself scrambling to come up with a way to take the program a second time just so you can pick his brain. Think about how much work that will be.  They aim to make this an easy experience where you rarely have to use powers of higher thinking.  This should be like the grand tour, a comfortable time away from home so that you can tell others that you simply summered in Italy. 

And the program would be so much better served in Rome.  I mean, just think on it.  You would never have to learn Italian because you’d be in a city full of tourists.  You’d get to pay twice as much for an apartment a third of the size of the one you rent in Amelia, and you wouldn’t have to live near any of your class mates.  A city the size of Rome is big enough that a half hour metro ride to each other’s places would be pretty much de rigueur.  This means you wouldn’t have to deal with any of those impromptu dinner/study sessions at the pool house.  And there certainly wouldn’t be random class-wide wine tastings at the Palazzo Venturelli. That’s just too much socializing anyway.  It’s unseemly.

And finally, let’s talk about the classes.  Do we really care about art crime? Sure, Dick Drent is pretty much the coolest human you’ll ever meet, and Dorit Straus somehow manages to make art insurance interesting, but really, do we care?  Isn’t that better left to one’s financial advisor?  And the secret porchetta truck that the interns will show you as you study the intricacies of art law, could surely be found on one’s own.  Couldn’t it?  I think we would all be much better served by just watching the terrible Monuments Men movie, fawning over George Clooney and Matt Damon, and thinking about the things we could be doing all from the safety and comfort of our own homes.  I do so hate leaving home.  The ARCA program involves work, and ten courses with ten different professors, and classmates that will quickly become family. It’s all so exhausting.  I mean really, tell me, does this sound like the program for you?

ARCA Editorial Note:  If you would like more information on ARCA's 2014 program please see our faculty and 2014 course listing here or write to education (at) artcrimeresearch.org for a copy of this year's prospectus and application materials. 

August 29, 2013

Thursday, August 29, 2013 - ,,, 1 comment

John Pollini on "The Bronze Statue of Germanicus from Ameria (Amelia)"

Professor Pollini lectures on Germanicus
John Pollini, Professor of Classical Art & Archaeology at the University of Southern California, delivered a talk, “The Bronze Statue of Germanicus from Ameria (Amelia)”, at the Museo Archeologico di Amelia for the Rome Society of the Archaeological Institute of America.

Here's a link to the summary of the talk (posted on Academia.edu) with this introduction:
The statue of Germanicus with its travertine base was discovered in 1963 outside the Porta Romana of the town along the ancient via Amerina. That the statue was found smashed into a number of fragments indicates that it did not fall accidentally from its base but was attacked, quite likely by Christians in the Late Antique period. The statue had probably been set up originally in an imperial shrine in connection with the ludi iuvenum (games of the local pre- or para-military youth organization known as the luventus) that would have taken place in the campus of America outside the city walls. 
Because it is a work of high quality, the statue was undoubtedly produced in a workshop in Rome and then transported to Ameria, where it was set up.
In his lecture, Professor Pollini describes the figures, pointing to the symbols of legal command and that of a supreme military commander and ‘a military tunic and high-laced boots, the calcei patricii, symbolic of patrician status. This is Professor Pollini’s description of the cuirass decoration:
The muscle breastplate is decorated with a plethora of appliqué figures symbolizing various aspects of victory. The central figures depict the ambush of the Trojan youth Troilos, son of King Priam, by the Greek hero Achilles. Represented above and rising out of a series of stylized sea waves is the winged sea monster Scylla hurling a rock in her upraised right hand. Flanking either side of the central scene of Troilos and Achilles and located just under the cuirass’s arm-openings are winged Victories. On the back of the cuirass is represented an incense-burner (thymiaterion), on either side of which are posed two Spartan female dancers (Lacaenae Saltantes), who celebrate a victory dance with baskets (kalathiskoi) on their heads. Circling the bottom of the cuirass are two rows of lambrequins (pteryges), that is, decorated leather straps. The upper row of straps features apotropaic motifs (symbols used to ward off evil), consisting of alternating heads of lions and bearded satyrs; the lower row, stylized victory palmettes.
And his interpretation of the program of the cuirass:
All the figurative and decorative elements represented on the cuirass have reference to military victory. The sea monster Scylla, who also serves an apotropaic function, may refer to victorious battles fought in the context of the sea or rivers. Since Roman commanders enjoyed emulating great Greek military personalities of the past, the representation of the legendary hero Achilles in the central composition would have been a suitable model, even though he slays here one of Rome’s ancestors, the Trojan prince Troilos. Although this might seem an odd subject to celebrate on the cuirass of a Roman commander, it should be remembered that without the fall of Troy there would be no Rome; and it was one of the prophecies that Troy would not fall if Troilos reached the age of 20 (Plaut. Bacch. 951-954; Mythographi Vaticani. I. 210). Therefore, this was all part of the divine plan! Achilles, moreover, was a model for great Roman leaders in Latin literature. In his famous messianic Eclogue (4.35-36), Vergil foretells the birth of a child (most likely the future Augustus), who as savior of Rome would bring peace to the world after military victories on land and sea. In the context of the wars that preceded the advent of this new Golden Age of peace, Vergil likened the great future Roman leader to Achilles: Erunt etiam altera bella atque iterum ad Troiam magnus mittetur Achilles (“There will also be other wars and a great Achilles will be sent again to Troy”). Therefore, the Achillean imagery on the cuirass has a dual meaning. The figural program of the statue’s cuirass referencing victory would also have been suitable for an original portrait statue of Caligula. Despite his aborted invasion of Britain in 39, Caligula celebrated a triumph in Rome for a sea victory over the sea-god Oceanus (Suetonius, Vita Tib. 46-47; Cassius Dio 59.27.1-4). This statue with cuirass heralding military victory could also have conveniently served to honor Germanicus, who won battles against the Germans on the Rhine and Weser and along the coast of the North Sea, for which he was awarded a triumph, as already noted. A transformation from an image of Caligula to one of Germanicus would have taken place after Caligula’s death in 41 A.D., at which time Claudius (10 B.C. - 54 A.D.), the uncle of Caligula and the brother of Germanicus, became emperor.
Also attending Professor Pollini's lecture in Amelia was Guilia Rocco, the Italian scholar and author of La Statua Bronze con Rittratto di Germanico (Roma 2008, Bardi Editore Commerciale) in which she proposes that the thorax was made around the first century BC in a Greek workshop in Pergamene for Mithradates VI, King of Pontus.

July 25, 2013

Report from Amelia: Erik Nemeth lectures on Cultural Security at ARCA's Postgraduate Certificate Program


by Yasmin Hamed, ARCA Intern

Week Seven of ARCA's Postgraduate Certificate Program got off to an unusual start with most of this year’s students off-site. Monday and Tuesday saw the remnants of the long weekend break where many of the students travelled both within and beyond Italy. Students enjoyed the sights around Italy such as Bari, Matera, Venice, Milan and Florence in addition to other locations beyond the borders such as Switzerland, Serbia, Marrakech and Malta.

Our slower than usual return to classes on Wednesday afternoon began our first day of a new module on Cultural Security led by Dr. Erik Nemeth. With a brief segue from art crime, our first encounter focused on the interdisciplinary nature of Cultural Security and the interactions of each discipline very thoroughly represented in our class from the three areas of physical, political and economic spheres.

With our first full day of classes we further examined the dimensions of cultural security during three main temporal spheres: the Second World War, the Cold War, and the Post-Cold War periods. The dynamics between cultural security and cultural intelligence opened up a discussion on the problems and solutions currently at play on the international field. Again, each student offered insights from their own fields. Dr. Nemeth’s presentations offered a view of cultural security through a series of well-known case studies such as the infamous destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhasin Afghanistan in 2001 and of the Samarra Mosque in Iraq in 2006.

A discussion of the great losses to cultural property could only be followed with the counter-active measures: cultural intelligence services. Dr. Nemeth’s scientific approach to this subject brought about a new way of attacking our studies through the use of statistical analysis. This data may be used to predict threatened cultural heritage sites worldwide by organizations who are tasked with the protection of cultural property in areas of conflict.

As we are getting further and further into the course, an interesting dynamic begins to arise. Having covered such significant areas such as bi-lateral agreements previously in our class on Art Crime in War with Judge Arthur Tompkins, in addition to during our class on Art and Heritage Law, we are now garnering a view of intricate subject areas such as this from a number of viewpoints. This multi-disciplinary approach to major issues within the area of art crime research is creating a solid foundation in our knowledge of this area with every new module. 

Coming off the hectic travel during the long weekend, and with no formally arranged class trips, most students took advantage of last weekend to relax. A fantastic birthday party for one of the students at the top of Amelia beside the duomo offered astounding panoramic views of Amelia. As Week Seven came to a close, some of our students even benefited from a poolside reading of Dorit Straus’ article on “Insurance Claims and the Art Market” in preparation for Week Eight in ARCA’s 2013 Postgraduate Program.

June 6, 2013

Thursday, June 06, 2013 - , No comments

Report from Amelia: ARCA Intern Summer Kelley-Bell on ARCA Orientation for the 2013 Program

ARCA Interns in Cisterne Amelia
May 28th marked the beginning of the summer adventures for ARCA’s 2013 group of interns. In this year’s batch, we have three student interns: Yasmin Hamed, Summer Kelley-Bell, and Sophia Kisielewska. They are joined by Laura Fanadino, an undergraduate from Wellesley, and Kirsten Hower, ARCA’s 2013 Program Assistant, who is in her third year of working with the program. Each week, this lovely group of ladies is going to be bringing you insight into the program and some of its behind the scenes happenings. To start you off, Hello! My name is Summer Kelley-Bell and I’m from Chattanooga, Tennessee. Now let’s jump straight in to ARCA’s program.

The week started off with a few bumps along the way as the interns were reminded that Italian time runs a bit differently than any other time. Thankfully, we had arrived a bit early in order to work out the kinks and we have quickly adapted to the way a small town runs. Amelia is situated on top of a hill. Through the initial getting to know you stages between the interns, there was also the opportunity to get to know this fascinating town. Each day that we walked through the Porta Romana on our way to the library for work, we were also walking past a section of Roman road that has been paved around. It has been preserved so that future visitors to the city, or in fact its current inhabitants, can appreciate the history of this hilltop town. 

The official arrival day for the students wasn’t until the 31st, so we had a few days to get ourselves situated. We have checked out the grocery stores; sampled the wares at Bar Massimo, a local café; and headed down to Dixie, where Sophia and Laura successfully navigated the purchase of internet keys. These “chiavetti” allow students to plug in a kind of thumb drive to their computers so that they can have internet anywhere there is a signal. All of these things were done in preparation for the arrival of the students. 

Friday the 31st was arrival day and it could have been a hectic day but it turned out quite well. Everyone banded together to navigate getting students from all over the world settled into their various Amerini apartments. Thankfully, the early arrival of the interns and the director, along with the help of Monica Di Stefano, the Amelia-based Social Director and Assistant, helped insure that everyone was safely placed in their homes. We met up later at La Locanda to officially welcome everyone to Amelia and to the program. This local restaurant has played host to ARCA in the past and it never disappoints. A large group of the students even stayed after the welcome cocktail had wound down in order to avail themselves of some of Locanda’s delicious food. 

Despite only being in the town for a brief period of time, students had very little problem finding their ways to the meeting point Saturday and then heading in to one of our classrooms for orientation. We heard speeches from the director and her various assistants, as well as a few words from Crispin Corrado, ARCA’s Acting Academic Director. Then the floor was given over to the students and we had a chance to get to know each other a little bit better. Saturday was given over to the idea of getting to know each other and the town and the interns even took some of the students on an optional walk to show them where to buy groceries and other such necessities.

However, the intern-led walk paled in comparison to Monica Di Stefano’s walk on Sunday. June 2nd marked “Corpus Domini,” a religious festival in Amelia where the streets are decorated with flower petals. Many of the students jumped at the chance to participate in this day and could be seen helping the locals to create rose petal angels and the like. We then had a walk around the city where Monica explained more of its history and grandeur. Monica showed us some of the wonderful little secrets that Amelia has to offer.

This year’s group of students comes from a variety of different backgrounds and places. They have come together from around the world to learn about something that interests each of us in different ways. This diversity is sure to translate into a very interesting program as each person brings their own unique experiences to the classes. I, for one, cannot wait to see where this will lead.

December 15, 2012

Saturday, December 15, 2012 - ,, No comments

Getting to know Amelia (Terni) "Borghi d'Italia (Tv2000)

Here's a video, "Amelia (Terni) - Borghi d'Italia (Tv2000)" which shows the town's ancient walls, the archaeological museum, the medieval traditions, and features local residents, including the bronze statue of Germanicus.

Highlights include the double organ so designed that a priest and a cloistered nun could play the keyboards at the same time; the monsignor of the duomo dedicated to Saints Fermina and Olympiades; and the theatre of Amelia.  Of course, a story about this ancient town wouldn't be complete without a few shots of some of the retired men hanging outside the Porto Romano.  

September 7, 2012

Friday, September 07, 2012 - ,, No comments

ARCA Opens Application for 2013 Postgraduate Certificate Program in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection

View of the civic tower from the garden of Palazzo Farrattini
The official application period for ARCA's 2013 Postgraduate Certificate Program in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection has opened.

The Association for Research into Crimes against Art (ARCA) 2013 Postgraduate Certificate Program in International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection Studies will be held from May 31 through August 12, 2013 in the heart of Umbria in Amelia, Italy.

This interdisciplinary program offers substantive study for art police and security professionals, lawyers, insurers, curators, conservators, members of the art trade, and post-graduate students of criminology, law, security studies, sociology, art history, archaeology, and history.

In its fifth year, this academically intensive ten week program provides in-depth, postgraduate level instruction in a wide variety of theoretical and practical elements of art and heritage crime. Students will explore its history, its nature, its impact, and what is currently being done to mitigate it. Students completing the program earn a postgraduate certificate under the guidance of internationally renowned cultural property protection professionals.

This program will expose participants to an integrated curriculum which occurs in a highly interactive, participatory, student-centered setting. Instructional modules include both lectures and “hands-on” learning from case studies, in situ field classes and group discussions. At the end of the program, participants will have a solid mastery of a broad array of concepts pertaining to cultural property protection, preservation, conservation, and security.

Students explore such topics as: art crime and its history; art and heritage law criminology; art crime in war; the art trade; art insurance; art security; law enforcement methods; archaeological looting and policy; cultural security; and art forgery.

At the close of the 10 week lecture portion of the program each candidate must complete a considerable piece of written work demonstrating original and significant research. ARCA assigns a supervisor to oversee the research. The supervisor provides final approval of a finished paper, which should be of publishable quality. After completion of all program coursework and the final paper a student is awarded ARCA’s postgraduate certificate in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection.

Important Dates:

November 15, 2012 - Early Application Deadline
January 15, 2013 - Application Deadline
April 2013 - Advance Reading Assigned
May 30, 2013 - Students Arrive in Amelia
May 31, 2013 - Welcome and Orientation June 01, 2012
June 3, 2013 - Classes Begin
June 21-23, 2013 - ARCA Annual Conference
August 9, 2013 - Classes End
August 10-11, 2013 - Students Housing Check-out **
Nov. 15, 2013 - Research Paper Submission Deadline

**Some students stay a few days longer to participate in the August Palio dei Colombi, Notte Bianca and Ferragosto festivities.

For questions about programming, costs, and census availability, please write to us for a complete prospectus and application at: education@artcrimeresearch.org.

February 15, 2012

Wednesday, February 15, 2012 - ,, No comments

Profile Update: ARCA Alum Marc Balcells ('11) Discusses the ARCA Postgraduate Certificate Program in International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection Studies

Marc Balcells at The Met, NY
by Catherine Sezgin, ARCA Blog Editor

Many page visits to the ARCA blog appear to be from those getting familiar with ARCA and the Postgraduate Certificate Program in International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection Studies. Last year I interviewed (via email) Marc Balcells, art historian and criminologist, before he entered the program in Amelia. This week I asked Marc Balcells, an Adjunct Professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice,  a few questions about his experience studying art crime in Umbria.

How did ARCA's program in International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection Studies support your interest in the subject?
Marc Balcells: Well, my interest on researching art crime has grown, of course. That was easy because of two reasons: first, because as a researcher/scholar/proud "ambassador" of the topic, I am very happy on conducting research non-stop. I do take it very seriously, so we can advance the field by very serious academic work.

Also, because those 10 weeks were fantastic, on the educational side... I have no words to really express how enriching that was! Professors, materials, books... On the book side let me tell you that when the girl at the check-in counter at Fiumicino wanted to weigh my trolley bag, well... it weighed more than 25 kilos out of how many books I bought in Amelia regarding art crime. I still remember her face! Nerdish? Maybe, but now imagine for three months a professor recommending this book, a guest speaker another, a panelist another... Your trolley will resent you!
The program culminates in the writing of an article -- what area of art crime or cultural protection did you research?
Marc Balcells: I am a criminologist conducting research on organized crime and the links with the art world, so it was obvious that my thesis went on that direction. Because I am in academia my thesis is just a first step on what it will be a longer project (and article) on defining organized crime operations in the art world (for my thesis I just used a small example), getting even to challenge that concept to the extent that maybe when we are talking organized crime in some cases it can be another thing (like occupational crime), changing the players and the scenarios where they act. I hope that more data and some crime-explaining theories will be useful on debating that point.
How have you continued your interest since leaving the program?
Marc Balcells: Well, since leaving the program the show just goes on and on! When I do teach, I like to use a lot of examples from my own research, or even from colleagues' and professors' experiences that I learned during the summer. So my students at John Jay College at the City University of New York get a good deal on art crime in both courses I teach. But I also must confess that ARCA's Postgraduate program really confirmed my belonging in this field, and I do take very seriously (no kidding here!) on producing serious empirical work that may establish art crime as a form of criminality that can rival any other better researched form of crime.

I do also take very seriously my "ambassador" role, and I feel that my columns on art crime, or my guest talks (both in an academic environment or on TV, radio or press: yes, future ARCA students, now you know a lot about that and media may want to hear what you have to say!) have to be very seriously addressed: that is, not only talking about the fancy crimes that everybody wants to hear, but also on the serious consequences art crime may have.
What did you enjoy about living in Amelia and what do you find that you miss?
Marc Balcells: Oh, I miss many things from Amelia. One of them could be the silence that allows you to contemplate every single building on the old part (works fantastic for working, or reading a good novel), even during week days. But I have to admit I treasure all the laughs and drinks we all shared at Fuori Porta or the bar at the Park. There were nights that were, simply put, memorable. On the foodie side, I miss the trofie al Pesto or the ragu alla lepre from Punto di Vino (and the cappuccinos), the Porcella pizza at Porcelli's; the lemon ice cream at Tropicana or my favorite breakfast, ciambelle, at Bar Leonardi! And even though I am a city boy, it will be fun being back for the conference, meeting the new cohort, and well... you know what they say about criminals: they like to go back to the scene of crime!
ARCA will be accepting applications for the 2012 program through the end of February; to request a prospectus and apply,  please contact ARCA Admissions at education@artcrimeresearch.org.

December 18, 2011

Museo Archeologico di Amelia: Pro Sexto Roscio Amerino

This post is part of a series highlighting the collection at the municipal archaeology museum in Amelia. This information is from museum's English placards.

The gens Roscia was one of the most important families of Ameria [the Roman name of Amelia] and was made famous by Cicero's renowned oration defending Sextus Roscius, accused of parricide by two members of his family: Titus Roscius Magnus and Titus Roscius Capito, one of whose descendants may have been mentioned in an inscription in Ameria. Cicero's words tell us about the wealth of his client's father -- thirteen very fertile plots close to the Tiber (Pro Rosc., 20) and about his influential ties with some of Rome's artistocratic families, such at the Metelli and the Scipio. The exploitation of landed property through the work of slaves must have been one of the ways the gens made its fortune. The family also had brickworks, attested to by the seals bearing the family name.

The wealth and reputation of the gens offered some of its members the opportunity to become city magistrates. Well-known family figures became members of the quattuorviri, and in the first half of the 1st century AD one of them -- Titus Roscius Autuma -- donated a thesaurus or container for offers of the faithful at the temples.

Pro Sexto Roscio Amerino

In 80 BC, Cicero defended Sextus Roscius of America, accused by two relatives of murdering his father. The two men responsible for the murder wanted to gain possession of the dead man’s property.

In 80 BC Cicero defended Sextus Roscius, who had been accused of murdering his father. Although this was his first causa publica (criminal case), it brought the orator – who was not even 30 years old at the time – enormous fame. Cicero later proudly recalled his courage in agreeing to defend the man, for in the final phase he had to accuse Chrysogonus, the powerful freedman of the Roman dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla, but without actually drawing the dictator’s name into the case (De officiis, 14.51).

The accusation of parricide was effectively the last stage of a conspiracy that, as Cicero successfully demonstrated, had been organized by two of Sextus Roscius’ relatives, Titus Roscius Capito and Titus Roscius Magnus, who had murdered the man and wanted to put their hands on his fortune with the help of Chrysogonus. Sextus Roscius – father and son bore the same name – was a wealthy citizen of Ameria whose friends included some of the most important Roman families. One night, he was murdered on his way back from a dinner in Rome, while his son was in Ameria. A few days later, the two conspirators convinced Chrysogonus to put the dead man’s name on the prosciption lists, though they had been closed for some time, in order to cheat the son out of his inheritance. In fact, through this prosciption Sextus Roscius’ property was confiscated and auctioned, only to be bought by Chrysogonus for a pittance compared to its real value, which would then be shared by the three.

In the meantime, in Sulla’s name (though unbeknownst to him) the freedman had received a delegation from the city of Ameria, pleading the cause of Roscius, father and son. Chrysogonus promised to look into the matter, but did nothing. At this point the young Roscius, reduced to poverty and facing a possible death penalty, decided to seek refuge in Rome with his father’s friend Cecilia Metella. While he was there, in order to get rid of him, the two relatives accused him of parricide, a crime punishable with death by drowning.

His father’s powerful friends rallied around him. Realizing the political implications of the trial, they decided not to enter the fray but to hand his defense over to Cicero, whose youth and supposed inexperience would have justified any unwarranted words. In his harsh attack of Chrysogonus, Cicero deftly avoided harming Sulla’s reputation, saying that the dictator could “not have been aware of anything, given that alone he has the entire government in his hands, and is so full of important commitments that he cannot even breathe freely (Pro Rosc., 22).

Sextus Roscius was acquitted of the accusation of parricide.

December 11, 2011

Museo Archeologico di Amelia: The Collection

Photo of the Spagnoli home
 (Museo Archeologico di Amelia)
by Catherine Schofield Sezgin, ARCA Blog Editor-in-Chief

This is part of a series highlighting information posted at the archaeology museum in Amelia, the Umbrian town which hosts ARCA's International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Program each summer.

The Museo Archeologico di Amelia began with the collection of artifacts by Giovanni Spagnoli, a public notary. He had purchased some items from the collection of from the Morelli family who had kept artifacts discovered in the late 19th century in the Viterbo area at their garden at Villa della Fontanelle in the hamlet of L'Annunziata di Amelia. The artifacts dated back to the late Roman Republic in terracotta works to 11th century reliefs.

Spagnoli brought the artifacts to his home in Amelia, according to the museum, "notifying the government in accordance with regulations."

Spagnoli wasn't the only one to collect artifacts. Some of the finest homes in Amelia reused objects from antiquity to decorate their homes. "In some cases, private recycling -- as elegant furnishings intended to bring greater prestige to the home or to decorate residential gardens -- distorted the meaning and original use of the item," the museum writes. For example, a piece from T. Roscius Autuma was originally intended to collect offers -- it was later reworked to serve as the basin of a fountain.

"As long as they still maintain a function, the surviving ancient structures are usually less restored and recycled for daily use though for applications that are clearly less prestigious than the original ones," writes the museum.

The museum exhibits are extensively curated with informational signs in English.

December 2, 2011

Museo Archeologico di Amelia: Artifacts from Amelia Spread to Other Collections in 19th century

Mars attacking (Rome, National Etruscan
 Museum of Villa Giulia)
by Catherine Schofield Sezgin, ARCA Blog Editor-in-Chief

I attended ARCA's Postgraduate Program in International Art Crime Studies in 2009, fell in love with our host town, Amelia, and have returned each subsequent summer for ARCA's International Art Crime Conference. However, I have never spent enough time in the archaeological museum to appreciate or learn about the town's history. Last July I abandoned my usual table on the patio of Bar Leonardi and not only dawdled for a few hours in the museum, but photographed many objects and the associated information that had kindly been translated into English. Then I uploaded the photographs into my computer and forgot about them until two weeks ago. In support of the museum's work, I will be offering a series of blog posts on sections of the antiquity section and later the art gallery.

Amelia's collection of cultural property displayed in the Museo Archeologico di Amelia (Archaeological Museum of Amelia) began with an excavation of a Roman theatre along Via di S. Elisabetta in 1820.

A "significant number of Amelia artifacts (bronze and lead votive objects)" according to the museum were "put on the antiquarian market and ended up in Italian and foreign museums and collections."

Statuette of Demeter (London, British Museum)
A partial list from the museum includes the following:
A group of small votive bronze objects from the Archaic period is preserved at the National Etruscan Museum of Villa Giulia in Rome (before it was at the Museum Kircherianum). 
A bronze statuette depicting Demeter on a chariot is from the collection at the British Museum in London. 
The 19th century excavations conducted in Pantanelli unearthed a series of votive figurines cut from lead foil. They were purchased by Baron E. de Meesert de Ravestein prior to 1864 for his collection and are now in Brussels. 
A bronze laminetta engraved in epichoric Umbrian characters on both sides (opistographic), found near Santa Maria in Canale, is currently preserved at the National Museum in Naples. The chain of events that ultimately brought the tablet to Naples began in 1788, when it came into the hands of the Benedictine abbott G. Di Costanzo, who purchased it from the Amelia antiquarian G. Venturelli. Di Costanzo then gave it to Cardinal Stefano Borgia, whose heirs sold it to the Bourbon Museum in Naples in 1817. 
An Imperial marble altar and two inscriptions are at the Vatican Museum. 
The altar, dedicated to the goddess Fortuna by Curiatus Cosanus, is now in Florence. In the 16th century, it was documented in the Church of Santa Firmina. It was then taken to Spoleto and is now part of the Bardini Collection.

October 18, 2011

The Collecting History of Stolen Art: the Capitoline Museums’ krater of Mithradates VI Eupator the Great, king of Pontus

Bronze krater of Mithradates the Great
by Catherine Schofield Sezgin, ARCA Blog Editor-in-chief

A large bronze vase, crafted under Mithradates the Great of Pontus, was stolen from Asia Minor during one of the Mithradatic Wars by either Sulla or Pompey; displayed in the seaside villa of a Roman Emperor; and owned by a pope before it entered the collection of the Capitoline Museum in Rome. This summer it visited Amelia.

According to the Archaeological Museum in Amelia, the krater may have been a gift to a school, a gymnasium, on the Greek Island of Delos for the inhabitants' support of Mithradates, the Greco-Persian ruler from the Black Sea kingdom who expanded his territory into Anatolia and Asia Minor to protest the occupation of the Romans and their taxation policies. The krater was likely shaped to mix wine with water and honey, and linked to Dionysus -- it is likely that the original vessel loops were decorated with branches and brunches of grapes (Museo di arcaeologico, Amelia).

In 87 BC, Mithradates’ generals fought for Roman-controlled Delos. “The destruction was devastating: the city was sacked and burned to the ground,” Adrienne Mayor writes in The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, Rome’s Deadliest Enemy (Princeton Press, 2009). “Thousands of able-bodied slaves, suddenly freed from Roman chains, joined the Greek liberation army. Mithradates’ generals killed virtually all the unarmed Italian merchants of Delos and sold their wives and children into slavery.”

On Delos, Mithradates’ generals looted the treasures from the great Temple of Apollo, then after storing most of the plunder on the island of Skiathos, moved the treasure to Aristion in Athens. The treasure was then used to finance Athens’ fight against Rome.

Mayor shows an image of this first century BC krater in The Poison King.  “During the First Mithradatic War,” Mayor writes, “this krater was apparently plundered by Sulla and taken to Rome.” [Mayor sites her information from a book by Deniz Burcu Erciyas, Wealth, Aristocracy and Royal Propaganda under the Hellenistic Kingdom of the Mithradatids in the Central Black Sea Region of Turkey. Colloquia Pontica 12. Leiden: Brill).

Whilst Mayor figures Sulla took the krater from Athens, information posted from the Archaeological Museum in Amelia this summer claims it was Pompey the Great who brought the krater from Greece to Rome with the spoils of war after the defeat of Mithradates. Regardless, both of these men looted from Mithradates.

Lucius Cornelius Sulla was dispatched by Rome to avenge the 88 BC massacre of Romans and Italians instigated by Mithradates the Great. Unfortunately, as soon as he left Rome, the 50-year-old Sulla (the name meant “Pimples” and referred to his complexion) suffered an upset by a political rival who declared Sulla “Public Enemy of Rome” and cut off his supplies and funds for 30,000 men. Before he could reach the Province of Asia, Sulla landed in Greece and began demands for money and fought for supplies. He eventually, as Mayor writes in The Poison King, “seized the sacred treasures of Greece, plundering the temples of Zeus at Olympia and Asclepius in Epidaurus. Selecting the most beautiful, precious art for himself, he melted down massive amounts of silver to pay his men and buy supplies.” Sulla destroyed Athens and then went on to the Province of Asia to win the First Mithradatic War.

Pompey the Great won the third and last of the Mithradatic Wars. In late 65 BC, the victorious Pompey, searching for Mithradates who had crossed to safety over the Caucasus Mountains, seized fortresses and treasures in Pontus. “The vaults at Talaura yielded cups of onyx and gold, splendid furniture, bejeweled armor and gilded horse bridles, Persian antiques, and the treasure from Cos – including the precious cloak of Alexander the Great,” Mayor writes.

The krater eventually reached the Italian peninsula:

"Two hundred years later, the krater belonged to the emperor Nero, who kept it at his luxurious seaside villa at Antium," Mayor writes.  "Unearthed from the villa’s ruins by Pope Benedict XIV in the eighteenth century, the bronze krater is now a centerpiece in Rome’s Capitoline Museum."

Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus was the grandson of Germanicus whose bronze image ended up in Amelia’s archaeological museum.

October 17, 2011

The Collecting History of Stolen Art: Amelia’s Bronze Germanicus

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin, ARCA Blog Editor-in-Chief

One of my reasons for writing about art crime is the history behind the objects stolen; artifacts in galleries and museums that physically tie us to the past. The collecting history of an object brings a historical context and a relevancy, a narrative from which we can differentiate some objects from the other hundreds or thousands on display. In this series on The Collecting History of Stolen Art, all of these objects can be found on display or in the collections of art or archaeological institutions. We can start with the bronze statue of Germanicus found in Amelia, the home of ARCA’s International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection Studies program.

Amelia’s bronze Germanicus is the combination of different parts, according to scholar Giulia Rocco, author of La Statua Bronzea con Rittratto di Germanico da Ameria (Umbria) (Roma 2008, Bardi Editore Commerciale). Rocco’s book is a detailed examination of the restoration of the bronze statue found outside the historical center of Amelia in 1964 while workers were excavating a mill.

In the English translation of her abstract, Rocco writes:
The thorax belongs to the Hellenistic Age, around the beginning of the first century BC and can be attributed to a Greek, perhaps Pergamene workshop…. The statue, which the cuirassed torso belonged to could represent Mithradates VI, king of Pontus, because of the myth on the chest of the breastplate, which Achilles killing Troilus, perhaps an allegory of the wished destruction of the Romans as descendants from the Troians. It could be one of the numerous objects brought to Rome as booty in the age of the Mithridatic wars.
Adrienne Mayor, an independent scholar, published a new biography of Mithradates under the title, The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, Rome’s Deadlinest Enemy (Princeton, 2011).

Mithradates the Great, of Greco-Macedonian-Persian descent and culture, objected to the Roman presence and subsequent onerous taxation policies in Asia Minor and Anatolia (now present day Turkey). In 88 BC, Mithradates organized the slaughter of 80,000 to 150,000 Romans and Italians living in the region. Then he established his headquarters in Pergamon, the kingdom bequeathed to the Romans in 133 BC and delivered a speech decrying his unification of the region against the Romans. Shortly thereafter, in the Theatre of Dionysus in Pergamon, he oversaw the execution of his Roman nemesis Aquillius, by melting gold and pouring it into the general’s mouth in front of an audience of 10,000 people.

It is probably at this time that the workshop in Pergamon made the cuirass that is now part of the Germanicus statue in Amelia. A cuirass is a piece of armor consisting of a breastplate and backplate fastened together.

Sulla, a ruthless Roman patrician commander dispatched to avenge Mithradates massacre of Romans and to recover Greece, according to Mayor in The Poison King, looted art from Greece to Asian Minor. It is possible that after the First Mithradatic War that he obtained the thorax that is now part of Amelia’s bronze Germanicas.

Rocco continues in her abstract:
It was subsequently transformed as an image of a Roman general speaking to his troops, probably one of the imperatores who fought against the king of Pontus. The provenance of the cuirassed bust and the chronology of the added parts, so as the fact that it has been found in Ameria, suggests that the bronze was transformed into a statue probably representing L. Cornelius Sulla, in whose honour monuments were erected in several municipia. 
Many years later, wishing to commemorate Germanicus, the monument was reused as iconic statue of the young prince, with a new head. This probably happened in the age of Caligula.
Germanicus was the father of the Roman Emperor Caligula.

The next post in this series will discuss more objects stolen by Sulla, including the krater on display in the archaeological museum in Amelia while Germanicus was displayed in Rome this year.

July 14, 2011

ARCA's 2011 International Art Crime Conference: Mayor Riccardo Maraga Welcomed the Participants to Amelia

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin, Editor-in-chief

Mayor Riccardo Maraga welcomed participants of ARCA's third annual International Art Crime Conference to the Palazzo Boccarini in Amelia last Saturday, July 9.

When citizens of the 3,000 year old Umbrian town elected Maraga from the Democratic Party in May 2011, they voted in one of the youngest mayors in Italy.

A native of Amelia, Riccardo Maraga graduated in Law from the University of Perugia with a thesis on "Labor and the Constitution". Last October, he earned his doctorate in Economic Law.

Readers may find out more about the Mayor of Amelia and his projects through his website here and on his Facebook page where he announced on Tuesday that he has been selected as one of 40 Young European Leaders for a meeting in December to be held in Paris.

July 3, 2011

Arthur Tompkins, Ludo Block & Saskia Hufnagel Will Participate in a Panel "Harmonizing Police Cooperation and Returns" at ARCA's Third International Art Crime Conference in Amelia on July 9, 2011

ARCA's third annual International Art Crime Conference will begin next Saturday, July 9th, with the panel "Harmonizing Police Cooperation and Returns" with Judge Arthur Tompkins, Ludo Block and Saskia Hugnagel.

Judge Arthur Tompkins, a District Court Judge in New Zealand, will present “Paying a Ransom: The Theft of 96 Rare Medals and the Reward Payments”:
In December 2007, 96 medals were stolen from New Zealand’s National Army Museum. Included were a number of Victoria Crosses, including one of only three Victoria Cross and bar combinations. Conservatively valued at over $5 million, the theft caused national and international outrage. A privately funded, substantial reward was offered for information leading to the medals’ return. In February 2008, after negotiations conducted with the perpetrators through a lawyer, the medals were recovered and substantial reward payments were made. Subsequently, two men were convicted of the thefts, imprisoned, and the reward payments were recovered. Using this crime as a case study, and referring also to other art and heritage crime reward cases, this presentation will traverse the arguments for and against the payment of ransom or reward in art and heritage crime cases, and legal issues relating to the payment of rewards in different jurisdictions will be considered. Psychological research and the experience gained with, and research conducted in relation to, ransom-seeking pirates off the coast of Somalia, will also be examined.
Arthur Tompkins has extensive experience in criminal trials and civil matters. Since graduating with a Masters of Law with First Class Honours from Cambridge University in England, Tompkins has pursued advances and uses of DNA in criminal cases and, in 2007, was elected an Honorary Member of Interpol’s DNA Monitoring Expert Group. In 2009, he presented “A Proposal for a Permanent International Art Crime Tribunal” at ARCA’s Inaugural Art Crime Conference. He is currently an Honorary Lecturer at the University of Waikato’s School of Law and a Visiting Faculty member for ARCA’s Postgraduate program in International Art Crime, teaching the “Art Crime in War” component.

Ludo Block, a former Dutch police officer and police liaison to the Dutch National Police in Moscow, will discuss his article, “European Police Cooperation on Art Crime”:

The academic literature in the field of cross-border policing tends to concentrate exclusively on the high-level crimes—drug trafficking, terrorism, and human trafficking—that are so often the focus of transnational police cooperation in criminal investigations. There are, however, many other types of transnational crime, including the often neglected art crime, which may represent the third most profitable criminal enterprise in the world, outranked only by drug and arms trafficking. Drawing on existing literature and interviews with practitioners, this study provides a comparative overview of the policing efforts on art crime in a number of European Union (EU) member states and examines the relevant policy initiatives of the Council of the EU, Europol, and the European Police College. It also addresses existing practices of and obstacles to police cooperation in the field of art crime in the EU. The study reveals that EU police cooperation in this field occurs among a relatively small group of specialists and that—particularly given the general lack of political and public attention—the personal dedication of these specialists is an indispensable driver in this cooperation.
Ludo Block focuses his research mostly on European police cooperation which is the subject of his PhD dissertation. His other interests are in intelligence, analysis, and law enforcement in the Russian Federation. He has lectured and written around the world concerning these issues, including his article “European Police Cooperation on Art Crime: A Comparative Overview” which will appear in the forthcoming edition of the Journal of Art Crime (Vol. 4).

Saskia Hufnage, a Research Fellow at the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security (CEPS) at Griffith University, Queensland, will present “Harmonising Police Cooperation in the Field of Art Crime in Australia and the European Union”:
Despite the fact that Australia and the European Union (EU) have different structures of governance, different histories, and different dimensions, both entities face surprisingly similar problems in relation to cross-border police cooperation. Australia is divided in nine different criminal jurisdictions, each policed by its own police force. As each police force is only competent on its own territory, with the exception of the Australian Federal Police (AFP), problems of border crossing, information exchange and joint investigations arise similar to those in the EU. This paper presents an overview of policing strategies in the field of art crime in Australia and compares existing problems in the EU to Australia. The necessity of legal harmonisation is overshadowed in this particular area by the importance of strong police-to-police cooperation, crucial for intelligence sharing – as it happens in the EU – and the lack of strong cooperation in the Australasian region. Possible avenues of advancing existing cooperation strategies in this particular field will be discussed.
Saskia Hufnagel was an Assistant Professor at the University of Canberra and a PhD student at the Australian National University in the fields of comparative law, criminal law, cross-border policing and sociolegal studies. She is a German lawyer and accredited specialist in criminal law. Recent publications include ‘“The fear of insignificance”: New perspectives on harmonizing police cooperation in Europe and Australia' (2010) 6(2) Journal of Contemporary European Research 165 and ‘German perspectives on the right to life and human dignity in the “War on Terror”’ (2008) Criminal Law Journal 101.

Sunday, July 03, 2011 - , No comments

ARCA's International Art Crime Conference to be Held July 9 and 10th - Award Winners Congratulated

by Kirsten Hower, ARCA Intern and Blog Contributor

ARCA's International Art Crime Conference will be held next weekend, July 9th and 10th, in Amelia, Italy.

ARCA (Association for Research into Crimes against Art) is a non-profit organization which researches contemporary issues in art crime and cultural heritage protection. ARCA’s mission is to serve as an accessible resource of knowledge and expertise necessary to increase the security and integrity of all art and cultural works. As an interdisciplinary research group/think-tank, ARCA aims to bridge the gap between the practical and theoretical elements of this global issue. ARCA utilizes its vast network of partners and colleagues including foreign and domestic law enforcement officials, security consultants, academics, lawyers, archaeologists, insurance specialists, criminologists, art historians, conservationists, as well as a number of others within the arts and antiquities communities to raise awareness of art crime and cultural heritage protection.

ARCA’s annual art crime conference is held at the seat of our MA Certificate Program, in Amelia, Italy, each summer. The focus of our annual conference is the academic and professional study of art crime, and how it can help contemporary law enforcement and art protection. ARCA seeks to encourage scholars and students worldwide to turn their attentions to the understudied field of art crime and cultural heritage protection.

ARCA congratulates its 2011 award winners:

ARCA Award for Art Policing & Recovery
Paolo Ferri
Dr. Ferri has served as Italian State Prosecutor and has been a prominent figure in the return of many looted antiquities from North American public and private collections. He now serves as an expert in international relations and recovery of works of art for the Italian Culture Ministry.

Eleanor and Anthony Vallombroso Award for Art Crime Scholarship
Neil Brodie
Dr. Brodie is an archaeologist who has written extensively on the looting of antiquities and their eventual sale. He has conducted archaeological fieldwork and was the former director of the Illicit Antiquities Research Centre at the University of Cambridge. His terrific writing on the illicit trade in antiquities stands as a thoughtful and passionate cry for the preservation of a vanishing and finite resource.

2009 Vallombroso Award for Art Crime Scholarship
Norman Palmer
ARCA is very pleased to have the opportunity to recognize in person the work of a past award winner, Norman Palmer. He chaired the Ministerial Advisory Board on the Illicit Trade in Cultural Objects (ITAP) from 2001 to 2005 whose work has lead the British parliament to enact the Dealing in Cultural Objects Act in 2003. He has been the chair of the Treasure Valuation Committee since 2001 which advises the Minister of the Arts on discovered portable discoveries. He has published widely on the law relating to cultural objects, personal property and commercial transactions. He is a member of the UK Spoliaton Advisory Panel.

ARCA is pleased to present the following awards to Lord Renfrew and Prof. Merryman who are unable to attend the conference this year.

ARCA Award for Art Security & Protection
Lord Colin Renfrew
Lord Renfrew has been a tireless voice in the struggle for the prevention of looting of archaeological sites, and one of the most influential archaeologists in recent decades. At Cambridge he was formerly Disney Professor of Archaeology and Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research and a Senior Fellow of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research.

ARCA Award for Lifetime Achievement in Defense of Art
John Henry Merryman
A renowned expert on art and cultural property law, Professor Merryman has written beautifully about art and heritage for many years. He currently serves as an Emeritus Professor at Stanford Law School. He adds this award to his impressive list of awards, including the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic and honorary doctorates from Aix-en Provence, Rome (Tor Vergata), and Trieste. His textbook Law, Ethics, and the Visual Arts, first published in 1979 with Albert Elsen, stands as the leading art law text. His writings have shaped the way we think about art and cultural disputes, and have added clarity and rigor to a field he helped pioneer.

June 17, 2011

Friday, June 17, 2011 - ,, No comments

Amelia, Umbria: In His First Criminal Trial, Cicero Defended Sextus Roscius the Younger from the Charge of Killing His Father, A Wealthy Resident of Amelia

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin, ARCA Blog Editor-in-Chief

Sometimes on this art crime blog we feature stories about Amelia, the town in Umbria that is hosting for the third year ARCA's Postgraduate Program in International Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection Studies.

This post is about not an art crime but murder. In 80 BC, during the dictatorship of Sulla, the only military commander to take victories in both Rome and Athens, a wealthy resident of Amelia was murdered in Rome. Sextus Roscius the Elder's estate in Amelia consisted of 13 farms and numerous slaves. He spent much of his time in Rome and left the farming to his son, Sextus Roscius the Younger, a middle-aged man who shunned social occasions and loved his work. One evening in September, while walking after dinner with two of his slaves, between 8 and 9 p.m. near the Palatine Baths, 'Old' Roscius was killed. Shortly thereafter, his estate was confiscated and put up for sale. This happened because at the time people who were not loyal to Sulla could be put on a list and have their assets sold. However, adding names to the list had stopped the year before Old Roscius was killed. Yet, sometimes, property was auctioned as if the owner had been listed. Two distant relatives, Capito and Magnus, purchased the farms.

A committee in Amelia felt that this was unfair so they sent a delegation to speak with Sulla and explain that Old Roscius had been in good standing at the time of his death and that the sale should be reversed. However, the delegation only spoke to a spokesman of Sulla who promised that the property would be restored to Sextus Roscius the Younger.

However, this delegation may have only been a smokescreen to appear to be seeking justice as the committee was headed up by Capito himself. What ended up happening is that Sextus Roscius the Younger was actually accused of killing his father in order to keep the property for himself. A witness came forward and said that the younger Roscius had been on poor terms with his father and was afraid of being disinherited.

No one thought that anyone would be brave enough to defend Roscius the Younger. Robbery and murder was common in Rome and the judicial court was easily bribed. People were afraid that they too would be accused by officials of or friendly to Sulla's regime.

However, the Roscius family had friends in Rome who convinced the 27-year-old Cicero to take the case.

The young advocat did not have to provide any evidence, just refute the accusations. Cicero defended Sextus Roscius the Younger by saying that he was uncouth and ignorant and the luxurious things meant nothing to him. In addition, Cicero said that the son had not been to Rome at the time of the death of his father, that he had been 50 miles away in Amelia. Cicero said that the younger Sextus had neither the means, the opportunity, or even the disposition to carry out such a crime. On the other hand, Cicero said, Magnus, a distant Roscius relative who had feuded for years over the estate, had been in Rome the night of the murder and had traveled to Amelia by dawn the next morning to tell his cousin Capito that Sextus Roscius the Elder was dead. Capito ended up owning three farms and Magnus managed 10 farms in the name of one of Sulla's administrators. Cicero gave such an impassioned speech that the 50 judges of the criminal court could not help but acquit Sextus Roscius the Younger, although Capito and Magnus never returned the property or faced charges in the death of Old Roscius.

In Amelia, just past Piazza Marconi and down Via Piacenti, you can find a plaque in memory of the Roscius family.

If you would like to read more about this case, you may read a summary of Cicero's "Pro Roscio Amerino" here and Chapter 4 of Anthony Trollope's book, The Life of Cicero, here.