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.

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

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?

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.

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.  

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

This week the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office announced the restitution of two two looted Cambodian sculptures, recovered as part of its ongoing investigation into global antiquities trafficking networks, including that of Subhash Kapoor, who is currently awaiting extradition from India to face charges in New York. 

A former Manhattan ancient art dealer who operated the gallery Art of the Past, Kapoor is at the center of one of the largest antiquities trafficking networks in history, orchestrating the looting and illegal sale of thousands of cultural artefacts from India, Cambodia, and other Southeast Asian countries. 

Operating under the guise of a legitimate antiquities dealer, Kapoor used his once-prestigious New York gallery to launder stolen artefacts many of which found their way into major museums and private collections worldwide. In India, he worked with temple looters and smugglers to steal sacred Hindu and Buddhist sculptures, many of which were violently removed from their original sites. Similarly, in Cambodia, Kapoor’s network targeted Khmer-era temples, plundering centuries-old statues and carvings that were then smuggled out of the country using falsified provenance documents.

Arrested in Germany on 30 October 2011 while on business to Cologne,  he was  extradited to India, where he remains in custody for his role in illicit activities tied to that source country, with U.S. authorities seek his extradition to face additional charges in New York. To date, investigations into his network have led to the recovery and repatriation of hundreds of looted artefacts, and has exposed the weaknesses in the ancient art market which were easily exploited.  

Cultural Significance of the Returned Artefacts

The Khmer artifact collection at the Wat Po Veal Museum was greatly damaged (with some artefacts looted) in the 1970s, as this early 1980s photo demonstrates. - Image Credit:CDCAM

The torso began circulating on the ancient art market in 1981 at Spink & Son, Ltd., a defunct London auction house that has frequently been linked to looted antiquities.  There it was acquired by a Chicago collector on 20 January 1982.   Once in the US, it remained in private hands for decades until it was placed up for sale by Freeman’s | Hindman auction in New York on 20 September 2024 as Lot 153, at which point the DANY-ATU swiftly intervened and seized the artefact.

The second artefact, a 12th-century Angkor-style Khmer Head of a Ruler, bears a fragmentary naga, a traditional symbol of royalty and divinity with a conical mukuta rising above a diadem carved in filigree design while a fragment of one heavy earring hangs from his right ear.  The sculpture, decapitated at the neck, is symbolic of so many sculptures, violently reduced to transportable moveable commodities by looters. The object was smuggled into the United States and funnelled through a network of dealers, including Kapoor and appraisers before coming to the attention of DANY's investigative team. 

The second artefact, a 12th-century Angkor-style Khmer Head of a Ruler, bears a fragmentary naga, a traditional symbol of royalty and divinity with a conical mukuta rising above a diadem carved in filigree design while a fragment of one heavy earring hangs from his right ear.  The sculpture, decapitated at the neck, is symbolic of so many sculptures, violently reduced to transportable moveable commodities by looters. The object was smuggled into the United States and funnelled through a network of dealers, including Kapoor and appraisers before coming to the attention of DANY's investigative team. 

Efforts to Repatriate Looted Heritage

The return of these sculptures highlights the close collaboration between U.S. authorities and the Cambodian government in reclaiming looted heritage. Ambassador Koy Kuong of Cambodia praised the effort, stating, “As we mark the 75th anniversary of Cambodia–U.S. diplomatic relations, this meaningful act reflects the strength of our enduring ties and our shared commitment to cultural preservation and justice.”

Assistant District Attorney Matthew Bogdanos, along with ADAs Jacqueline Studley and James Edwards-Lebair, led the investigations, supported by a team of investigative analysts and international experts. The efforts were further bolstered by the contributions of Cambodian officials and scholars from the University of Poitiers’ Celtrac Team.

The work of the ATU serves as a crucial reminder of the enduring impact of cultural theft and the importance of holding those responsible accountable. With Kapoor’s extradition still pending, the battle against illicit antiquities trafficking continues, but each successful repatriation marks another step toward justice and the restoration of global heritage.

For over a decade, the District Attorney’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit (ATU) has worked alongside international partners to investigate Kapoor and his co-conspirators for their alleged role in the illegal looting, exportation, and sale of artifacts from South and Southeast Asia. This extensive probe has resulted in the convictions of five individuals, with extradition proceedings pending for five more. In total, more than 30 artifacts have been repatriated to Cambodia in recent years, underscoring the ATU’s commitment to dismantling smuggling rings and restoring cultural property to its rightful home.

Investigative support for these returns was provided by Huot Samnang, Director of the Department of Antiquities, Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, Cambodia; CelTrac (Cellule de recherche des trafics des biens culturels) at the Université de Poitiers; and Mélanie Theillet.

Seized by Swiss authorities in the Canton of Basel 10 years ago, this 18th or19th century (Khmer empire) Buddha, seated in vajraparyankasana, with the proper right hand touching the earth in bhumisparsha mudra, at the moment of his enlightenment, is finally on his way home.  

Originally Swiss experts believe the sculpture dated back to the pre-Angkor or early Angkor Periods and is was assumed to be over 1,000 years old. However, according to a first-step assessment by experts from the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts (MCFA), based on form and style, the sculpture is believed to be of the later period. 

Representing Cambodia ata ceremony held on 6 February 2024, His Excellency Mr. H.E. Dara, Cambodia's Ambassador to Switzerland and Permanent Representative to the United Nations and International Organizations in Geneva received the enlightened Buddha in a handover between both countries coordinated by Fabienne Baraga, Head of the Specialist Department for International Cultural Heritage Transfer, at the Federal Office of Culture and Anna Mattei Russo, Head of Southeast Asia and Pacific Regional Coordinators of the Swiss Foreign Ministry. 

Ambassador In Dara expressed gratitude to the Swiss government and emphasised Cambodia's ongoing efforts to repatriate other significant cultural properties. He called upon museums, institutions, and curators holding Khmer antiquities to voluntarily return them to Cambodia, framing such actions as gestures of generosity and respect for cultural values.

As a source country, Cambodia's cultural heritage has suffered significant losses due to looting, particularlyas an outcome of periods of civil conflict, political instability, and poverty. The widespread looting of archaeological sites and temples, such as those at Angkor Wat, Preah Vihear, and Banteay Chhmar has resulted in the illicit trafficking of countless artefacts out of the country. 

These artifacts, ranging from ancient sculptures to intricate carvings, represent key aspects of Cambodia's history, religion, and artistic achievement. The illegal trade in Cambodia's cultural heritage not only deprives its people of its rightful treasures but also erases vital connections to its past for future generations. 

Efforts to combat looting and repatriate stolen artefacts from the country are ongoing, but the scale of the problem underscores the urgent need for international cooperation and collective action to safeguard Cambodia's cultural legacy.

In 2013 the Metropolitan Museum of Art restituted two,10th-century, Koh Ker stone statues, known as the “Kneeling Attendants” to Cambodia.  These artefacts had been donated in separate stages to the Museum in the late 1980s and early 1990s and had been associated with antiquities collector-dealer-trafficker Douglas Latchford, a/k/a “Pakpong Kriangsak”, who for 50 years, was once considered one of the world’s leading authorities on Asian Art before his unmasking. 

As early as 2012, Bangkok-based Latchford had already been identified in a civil lawsuit, as a middleman in the trafficking of looted Khmer sculptures from “an organized looting network” and was said to have conspired with the London auction house Spink & Son Ltd., to launder looted temple antiquities. 

Douglas Latchford's Facebook photo on 28 October 2017, two years before he was indicted.

In 2019 charges were filed in the United States against the then 88 year old Latchford by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Feinstein, in the Office’s Money Laundering and Transnational Criminal Enterprises Unit, for his purported role in "wire fraud, smuggling, conspiracy and related charges pertaining to his trafficking in stolen and looted Cambodian antiquities." Many of the suspect objects mentioned in his 25 page indictment passed through his hands en route to the Met and other important collections, during the course of his business operations.  Latchford died on 2 August 2020 before he could be extradited to the United States and his indictment was formally dismissed, due to his death, the following month. 

Last Friday, the United States authorities announced that the Met would be returning fourteen more pieces to Cambodia, dating from the ninth to the 14th centuries, plus an additional artefacts to Thailand.

The pieces going home to Cambodia are:

This 7th century CE pre-Angkor period sandstone Head of a Buddha, which was purportedly with implicated New York dealer Doris Wiener from 1984–2005 until she gifted it to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2005, upon which it was given Accession Number: 2005.512.  

This 10th - 11th century CE copper Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara Seated in Royal Ease. It was given Accession Number: 1992.336 when it was purchased directly from Douglas Latchford using funds from the Annenberg Foundation Gift. 

This 11th century sandstone Standing Female Deity, (probably Uma), Accession Number: 1983.14 was sold by Douglas Latchford to Spink & Son Ltd., London,  who in turn sold it onward to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

This 10th century sandstone Standing Female Deity, which was given Accession Number: 2003.605. This artefact was purportedly with Doris Wiener from 1998 through 2003.  Various saved accession record dates show it was either donated to the Metropolitan by Doris Wiener, in honour of Martin Lerner or was purchased through this New York dealer. 

This partially fragmented 930 - 960 CE  bronze Face from a Male Deity, came to the museum via a Latchford donation in honour of Martin Lerner.   It was given Accession Number: 1998.320a–f.

This ca. 920–50 CE stone Head of a Buddha, was also donated to the museum by Douglas Latchford in 1983 (with no provenance listed), where it was given Accession Number: 1983.551. 

This 10th century, Angkor period bronze Head of Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Infinite Compassion was in circulation with Spink & Son Ltd., London until 1998, when it was then sold to an undisclosed private collector who donated the artefact to the Metropolitan the same year, and was given Accession Number: 1998.322.

This 11th century, Angkor period, bronze Four-Armed Avalokiteshvara (Bodhisattva of Infinite Compassion)  This bodhisattva is often depicted with multiple heads and arms symbolising his limitless capacity to help alleviate grievances and is venerated as the ideal of karuna, the willingness to bear the pain of others.  Given Accession Number: 1999.262, the statue was directly purchased by the museum from Douglas Latchford via funds from Friends of Asian Art Gifts, Cynthia Hazen Polsky Gift, and Josephine L. Berger-Nadler and Dr. M. Leon Canick Gift. 

This 11th century architectural Lintel with Shiva on Nandi, Accession Number: 1996.473. This doorway topping was previously purchased in 1993 by Steven M. Kossak, owner of the prominent "Kronos Collections", who then loaned the piece to the Met for three years before eventually donating it to the museum in 1996. 

This late 9th century, stone Angkor period, Khmer style of Bakong, Headless Female Figure, Accession Number: 2003.592.1, is said to have been in the possession of Latchford's friend, Alexander Götz.  Originally living in Bali, then for a time in Germany, Götz and his family moved to London in 1990 where he opened a gallery specialising in Southeast Asian art, with Indonesia as the main focus. He closed his London gallery in 2015 and has since moved back to Indonesia.

This late 12th century, stone Angkor period, Standing Eight-Armed Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Infinite Compassion. Given Accession Number: 2002.477, this stature was sold by Douglas Latchford to Jeffrey B. Soref, heir to the Master Lock fortune, who sits on the Board of Directors at the Metropolitan.  Soref in turn loaned his purchase to the Met from 1999–2002 before gifting it to the museum in 2002.  Authorities in Cambodia had received information from a reformed looter named Toek Tik, who admitted to personally stealing this, as well as other artworks from Cambodia over a span of 20 years during his time as a smuggler.

This 7th–8th century, bronze pre-Angkor period, Ardhanarishvara (Composite of Shiva and Parvati), depicts the god as half male and half female representing the Shakta as worshipper and Shakti as devotee relationship which gives the Ardhanarishvara male and female characteristics.  Assigned Accession Number: 1993.387.4 the female side of this sculpture depicts Parvati’s elegant hairstyle and flowing skirt and exposed breast, while the male side gives us half of Shiva’s moustache, as well as his third eye.  Originally, the public accession record listed only the donation of this object as coming from Enid A. Haup (who had purchased and donated another problematic piece).  The more recent the Met's record was updated to state that the statue was sold by Spink & Son Ltd., London to Haupt who gifted it to the Met in 1993.

This 9th century, stone Angkor period depicting the Head of Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara. Given Accession Number: 1997.434.1, it was previously owned by American pipeline billionaire George Lyle Lindemann, a collector who frequently bought Khmer artefacts from individuals, some of whom were later implicated in the trade and trafficking of Cambodia's cultural heritage.  Lindemann gifted the object to the Met in 1997, who listed the object with no prior provenance, aside from the name of the wealthy donor.

This 11th century, sandstone Angkor period, Male Deity, probably Shiva.  Depicted with four-arms and a high chignon of jatamukuta, wearing a pleated sampot, this statue was given Accession Number: 1987.414.  The Met's website listed that the statue as previously owned by Margery and Harry Kahn who gifted the object to the Met in 1987 and that the statue "likely formed the centerpiece of a triad in a chapel of an unidentified temple in the vicinity of Angkor Thom.  Its style relates to sculptures recorded from the Baphuon temple, a monumental step-pyramid dedicated to Shiva, built as the state temple by King Udayadityavarman II."

The Artefacts Returning to Thailand are:

This 11th century Gilt-copper alloy, with silver inlay, possibly miss-named statue of a Standing Shiva, is believed to be the most complete extant gilded-bronze image from Angkor.  Given Accession Number: 1988.355, it belongs to a small group of metal sculptures of Hindu deities associated with royal cult practices that were discovered in Khmer territories including Cambodia and northeastern Thailand.  The statue was purchased by Walter H. and Leonore Annenberg via Spink & Son Ltd., London in 1988 and donated that same year to the Met. 

This 11th century bronze inlayed with silver and traces of gold statue of a Kneeling Female Figure, perhaps a Khmer queen, who kneels in a posture of adoration with arms raised above her head and palms pressed together.  Given Accession Number: 1972.147, she was sold to the museum by Doris Wiener. 

"Every one of the 1.5 million objects in our collection has a unique history, and part of the Museum’s mission is to tell these stories. When, how, and where was it created? Who made it and why? What was going on at that time and place in history? The Met also examines the ownership history or provenance: where has the object been and in whose care?" 

 

We are standing in front of a single-piece sand-stone sculpture of a serenely smiling cross-legged Shiva being worshipped by the small, dumpy Skanda (Fig. 3), the one the Guimet questioned. It was probably made in the second quarter of the 10th century for Jayavarman IV's new capital at Lingapura, today's Koh Ker, and is possibly a symbol of the king and his son. 'This is spectacular. I was shown a picture of it in pieces in the mid-Eighties. The head of Shiva was off, the arms broken, Skanda's feet broken. I bought it. It arrived in three pieces. Neil Perry-Smith, one of the leading restorers of stone, metal and gold, put it together. These had been clean breaks, there's no restoration.' Indeed, the breaks are invisible. 'Go by the wall so you can see Skanda's face', he says, so that I can observe how the artist has trapped religious bliss in the face. 'I sum it up in one word: adoration.'

After boarding a plane in the UK for New York and arriving yesterday, Neil Perry-Smith surrendered voluntarily to officers from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) in relation to an arrest warrant issued against him through the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office for his alleged role in an international smuggling ring that trafficked in stolen works of art.  According to Manhattan Assistant District Attorneys Matthew Bogdanos and Christopher Hirsch, the well-organized smuggling network is believed to have laundered hundreds of objects out of India and other source countries onto the licit art market in an operation that is believed to have lasted for as long as thirty years. 

On 8 July 2019 arrest warrants were issued for eight defendants involved in the scheme listing a total of 213 Counts, ranging from grand larceny to criminal possession of stolen property.  The original 28 counts listed against Perry-Smith in the Manhattan complaint were:

In that previous DANY's painstakingly detailed felony arrest warrant, it is alleged that Perry-Smith was one of at least seven individuals identified through their investigation who participated in an international criminal network handling material later sold by disgraced ancient art dealer Subhash Kapoor and his former gallery Art of the Past, once located at 1242 Madison Avenue, in New York. 

As a result of this ongoing international investigation into this network's operations, officers with DHS-HSI, working with the District Attorney's Office in Manhattan conducted a total of twelve raids, resulting in the seizure of 2,622 objects valued at no less than $107,682,000 from Kapoor's gallery and numerous storage locations within the jurisdiction of the state of New York. 

The July 2019 Felony Arrest Warrant document listed 72 stolen antiquities possessed by Subhash Kapoor or members of his network from 1986 to 2016 giving an estimated value to the pieces at $79,101,000.  Of those 72, only 33 had been identified and seized by law enforcement as of the summer of 2019.   Thirty-nine other artefacts had still not been located and were estimated to be worth no less than $35,835,000.  Investigators suspect that Kapoor orchestrated to have the missing objects hidden sometime following his initial arrest in Germany in 2011 and prior to his extradition from Europe to India to answer to the charges he faces for the trafficking in ancient artefacts from his home country. 

In July 2020, the Manhattan DA’s Office also filed extradition paperwork for Subhash Kapoor, in answer to their previous arrest warrant relating to his alleged crimes carried out in the United States.  In the meanwhile, Kapoor remains in the high-security block of Tiruchirapalli Central Prison in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu pending the completion of his first trial in India. 

As it relates to Neil Perry-Smith's alleged role, little detail was mentioned in the lengthy July 2019 Felony Arrest Warrant document.  It stated simply that Subhash Kapoor shipped artefacts with forged bills of lading, first to a company in Hong Kong, while arranging for the antiquities to be restored. Those artefacts would then be shipped from Hong Kong onward to either Neil Perry-Smith in London or to Richard Salmon in New York for restoration, who would then work on the objects before forwarding the conserved artefacts on to Kapoor for sale through his New York gallery. 

But yesterday's confirmation of Perry-Smith's surrender to New York authorities elaborates further on the charges awaiting the London restorer.  In their press release,  Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, Jr. states that "Smith" is "charged with possessing and restoring 22 stolen pieces, with an estimated value of more than $32 million" including bronze murti, normally housed in temples, representing the goddess Uma Parvati, Naga Buddha, and Shiva as Lord of Dance (Nataraja).  Laundered onto the licit art market, the bronzes Perry-Smith is alleged to have handled have an estimated market value of more than $32 million, all of which were subsequently shipped on to the conspiracy ringleader Subhash Kapoor for sale in his Manhattan gallery. 

“Without restorers to disguise stolen relics, there would be no laundered items for antiquities traffickers to sell.” -- District Attorney Vance.

But as we can read from the November 2008 quote excerpted at the top of this blog post, we know that Neil Perry-Smith also restored works of ancient art for at least one other suspect ancient art dealer also previously under indictment for the handling of looted antiquities. 

Shiva and Skanda 10th Century CE 130 cm

Taken from an interview article in Apollo Magazine, we learn that Perry-Smith restored a 10th century Cambodian  Khmer sculpture of Shiva & Skanda for the deceased British art collector and dealer Douglas A.J. Latchford.  One that, in Latchford's own words, arrived to the Thai-based collector-dealer broken in three pieces, with clean breaks.  Clean breaks are a tell-tale sign that the artwork may have been intentionally broken, with breaks such as these, along specific, easily repairable points being done to ease transport and future reassembly, when large cumbersome sculptures are removed from their find spots by looters. 

Prior to his death, Bangkok-based Latchford, had himself been indicted, in November 2019,  in the US Federal Court of the Southern District of New York for wire fraud, smuggling, conspiracy, and related charges pertaining to his own alleged trafficking in stolen and looted antiquities from India and Southeast Asia.  Once considered a pre-eminent collector and expert of Cambodian antiquities, the disgraced 88-year-old Latchford died on 2 August 2020 at his home in Bangkok before his case could be brought to trial in the United States.

Prior to Latchford's indictment, the Cambodian Ministry of Culture also identified Neil Perry-Smith's UK-based Private Limited Company Neil F. Perry as the restorer who worked with Jonathan Tucker and Antonia Tozer's London firm Asian Art Resources.  Tucker and Tozier had brokered the sale of 10 restored Angkorian-era gold jewellery pieces that, like so many others, had appeared on the ancient art market via Douglas A.J. Latchford's network, with no known legitimate provenance.  These pieces had been published in Latchford's and Emma C. Bunker's 2008 book:  Khmer Gold: Gifts for the Gods and were ultimately forfeited voluntarily to the Kingdom of Cambodia in April 2017. 

It remains to be seen what concrete evidence, if any, Neil Perry-Smith can, or will, choose to share with the authorities about the pieces he handled originating from both Douglas Latchford's and Subhash Kapoor's networks.  But with 29 counts now racked up against him, we suspect he won't feel ambivalent about giving up what he knows, trading testimony for the expectation of possible sentencing discounts. 

Left: Steve Green and the Controversial Coptic Galatians fragment first offered on eBay in 2012 by Yakup Ekşioğlu. Right: Douglas Latchford and the two plinths with the broken feet of ancient sandstone statues looted from the Prasat Chen temple complex in Koh Ker

Last week we have seen two eye-popping notices of "voluntary" restitution of  ancient artefacts and papyri framents believed to have been plundered from their respective countries of origin.

In one instance, an article by Tom Mashberg, written for the New York Times on January 29th reported that Julia Ellen Latchford Copleston a/k/a Nawapan Kriangsak, has agreed to relinquish a total of 125 artefacts to Cambodia which had been acquired by her father, controversial antiquities dealer Douglas A.J. Latchford, a/k/a “Pakpong Kriangsak.”  Prior to his death, Latchford's handling of suspect material from Cambodia, Thailand and India resulted in the US government filing a 26-page indictment via the Department of Justice's U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York on 27 November 2019.  This case, unfortunately, concluded in advance of any possible legal ruling against the Thailand-based dealer, who died on 2 August 2020 before the bulk of the evidence gathered in the federal case against him could be heard in court. 

The second announcement, delivered two days earlier by Steve Green, Chairman of the Museum of the Bible, was more discreetly posted on the museum's website and highlighted the return of a number of questionable acquisitions which have been discussed with some regularity on  ARCA's blog as well as in greater detail on Faces & Voices, a specialist blog by Papyrologist and ancient historian Roberta Mazza.  Mazza has more articles about the Green's acquisitions than I can link to, so I recommend our readership take some time exploring them all but perhaps starting here with one where she questions (again) the ever-changing provenance story surrounding the P.Sapph.Obbink fragment purportedly sold through a private sale treaty by Christie’s.  

In Green's press announcement, he states that as of 7 January 2021, the Washington DC-based museum had transferred control of the fine art storage facility that housed the 5,000 Egyptian items to the U.S. government as part of "a voluntary administrative process."   Unfortunately, the philanthropic founder of the museum has said very little about whether or not his museum will be more forthcoming about exactly whom the museum paid when purchasing the 8,106 clay objects with suspect or no provenance from the Republic of Iraq or the approximately 5,000 papyri fragments and accompanying mummy cartonnage which also came with suspect or no provenance from the Arab Republic of Egypt.  All we know is that these objects are now, finally, going home.  And while that is a great success for the countries they were taken from, it tells us practically nil about the men who engaged in their sale and profited from these same countries' exploitation.  

At the end of their announcement, the Museum of the Bible's Chairman stated that going forward they would continue to look for ways to "partner with The Iraq Museum, The Coptic Museum, and other institutions, to provide assistance with preserving and celebrating the rich cultural histories of those countries and many others."  I truly doubt, given the circumstances, that the Egyptian government will be taking Mr. Green up on this proposal. 

Museum of the Bible Press Release Screenshot Date:27 January 2021

And so the litigation in these matters, at least as it relates to Iraq and Egypt, appear to be drawing to a close.  

With the flourish of pens in the plump fingers of lawyers, these carefully-timed, and responsibility-for-wrong-doing-absent restitutions by members of the wealthy Houses of Latchford and Green are released to the public without the impediment of contradiction.   Sanitised proclamations which imply good deeds done under trying circumstances, but which impart little about the actual motivations of their delayed generosity.  

Most of us, who have been closely following these events can speculate as to the pressure points behind the disputants' seemingly magnanimous handovers and come away with our own conclusions, but our speculation will never give us their complete stories.  It is reasonable to assume that these individuals, and/or their museum, were motivated, in whole or in part, by a desire to put an end to a publically embarrassing chapter to their respective family's cultural heritage acquisition histories, but their decisions should not be read as merely repentant.  

In relinquishing these artefacts to Cambodia, Egypt and Iraq, the Latchfords and Greens seek to mitigate the damages, financial and reputational, that these scandals have caused them.  And with that in mind, their decisions can not simply be seen in a vacuum of attempting to right past wrongs. They are assuredly more strategic than what is within the purview of the public domain. 

Seen through this narrow lens, these very public announcements of voluntary restitution, published in newspapers with large readership or on museum's websites, serve only to cosmetically cover, not correct, the public blemishes their respective criminal investigations have brought to light over the last ten years.  Actions which, when explored more deeply, can be seen as not only embarrassing, or ethically negligent, but potentially criminal, brought about by the direct involvement of staff and family members who should have, or definitely did know, better.  

Despite these joyous restitutions, we cannot ascertain what catalyst, in each of these drawn-out processes of ensuring restorative justice, brought Mr Green and Ms. Copleston to the restitution table.  Usually, in situations like this, written agreements between the parties make it unlikely that anyone will be at legal liberty to openly discuss the negotiations between the aggrieved parties.  In the MotB case, that includes the unspoken details behind the more than three years of back and forth discussions that the museum itself has admitted took place prior to the culmination of this week's announcement. 

Likewise, by bequeathing his 1,000-year-old Khmer Dynasty collection to his daughter, Douglas Latchford left his offspring with more than just $50 million worth of valuable ancient art.   He left her holding a hand grenade with a pulled pin that she doggedly continued to hold some five months after her father's death.  For no matter how magnanimous Copleston's repatriation gestures to Cambodia may seem in print, her waiting this long to relinquish the sculptures begs its own questions as to motivating factors. 

Why would a lawyer such as herself, who by her own statement in the New York Times defensively admitted that her father "started his collection in a very different era" not have advised her ailing father, who was facing prosecution on his death bed, to clear the family name, if not his own, by simply returning the artefacts to Cambodia himself while he was still living?  Or why,  since Latchford's death, has Copleston, not distanced herself from suspicion by voluntarily doing so immediately after any wills for her father were read?

As regards both of these restitutions I would ask these individuals why, with these grand gestures of reconciliation, did neither party turn over the purchase and sale records for these objects.  Something which would truly make reparations as doing so would allow illicit trafficking researchers and law enforcement investigators to trace and return other pieces of history handled by the individuals responsible for engaging in these two unseemly debacles. 

Instead, like with Green's own statement, we get no real responsibility-taking, only precisely worded announcements with appealing attestations which colour their actions as generous acts of voluntary cultural diplomacy.  This despite the fact that there is so much more they could do, aside from simply cutting their losses by relinquishing material. 

In resignation, I understand that decisions like these, come about as the result of complex cultural arbitration.  And I understand that in such circumstances, the party holding the stronger deck of cards in the dispute, might (still) agree to a more palatable dispute resolution outside the courtroom. One which allows the parties involved to avoid a lengthy, expensive, and in some cases, reputationally damaging legal case, but which also assures an alternatively beneficial outcome for all sides. 

And as much as I want to be privy to these closed conversations, it is important to remind myself that Alternative Dispute Resolutions, known as ADRs in cultural property disputes, often carry with them an adherence to mutually agreed-upon confidentiality regarding the agreements signed off on, even when these types of agreements don't "feel" satisfying to those of us not sitting at the negotiating table. 

As someone who works on the identification of illicit antiquities, I want to see individuals, believed to have behaved criminally, brought to justice.  But I must also understand that these types of quieter negotiations do offer aggrieved parties an opportunity for a speedier and less costly resolution than drawn-out, complex, multi-year litigation which of themselves can be more beneficial to harvest countries such as Egypt and Iraq.   Fighting for restitution in the US court system isn't cheap and the costs can be a financial impediment to some foreign governments who haven't the financial means to represent their interests for years on end, or when the application of legal norms to relevant facts, might fail to deliver any justice at all to them as the aggrieved party. 

Another driving factor to remember in these types of agreements, in contrast to legal proceedings, is that out of court settlements enable the parties involved to, on the surface at least, legally protect their reputations. When cases go to court there is normally a winner and a loser.  And with those court decisions, comes very public case records which can serve to outline, in embarrassing red marker detail, the actions of individuals perceived as culpable, or serve as precedent-setting decisions in future illicit trafficking court cases. 

Lastly, as legislation in the art and cultural heritage field is not fully harmonized, there is always the potential risk that the expensive and protracted court case might not achieve a viable cost-benefit outcome.  Like in legal disputes where the value of the returned artefact is less than the country's legal costs in pursuing the case in foreign courts.  Or, as would have been the case in the Museum of the Bible dispute, or the case against Douglas Latchford, where the sheer number of artefacts being contested, if examined individually and concretised in the court's record, might have resulted in fewer objects going home, or greater exposure of the involved parties to subsequent litigation for their perceived roles in further uncovered, questionable transactions.

So, in the end, I have to accept announcements like those made last week which bring objects home but offer no real retribution against those who behaved badly.  This leaves me, and others who have closely followed these cases, asking:

• Where are the admissions of fault?  
• Where are the acknowledgements of harm having been done? 
• Where are the answers we keep asking as to who sold what, to whom, and when?

I close this overly long rant by saying that when I first learned about these upcoming restitutions and read the press releases, I immediately thought that their announcements reminded me of a rhetorical expression from the 1887 compendium of proverbs called The Salt-Cellars by Charles H. Spurgeon, who once wrote:

“A hog in a silk waistcoat is still a hog.” 

And while I am overjoyed that so many artefacts will finally make their way back to where they rightfully belong, I am in no way fooled that these gestures were magnanimous and selfless, or that in Egypt at least, Ma’at, the goddess of truth and justice, would believe that justice has been well and truly served. 

By:  Lynda Albertson