The new George Clooney action movie The Monuments Men, inspired by the men and women who served in the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives section during World War II, is also energizing museums to reach out to their communities about the true story.

The Frick Museum's website has a section on "The Frick During World War II":

The Monuments Men were a multinational group of 350 men and women who volunteered for military service in order to protect monuments and other cultural treasures from destruction during World War II. In civilian life, many of them were museum directors, curators, artists, architects, and educators. These dedicated men and women tracked, located, and ultimately returned to their rightful owners more than five million artworks and cultural items stolen by Hitler and the Nazis. Their role in preserving Europe’s cultural treasures was without precedent. 

The Frick Art Reference Library in Wartime 

The story of the Monuments Men in Europe has become increasingly well known, but few are aware that another group of dedicated art historians were engaged in “the fight for art” on American shores. In 1943, William B. Dinsmoor, a Harvard professor and Chairman of the American Council of Learned Societies, established the Committee on the Protection of Cultural Treasures in War Areas. Made up of thirty volunteer American and European scholars, the committee was charged with creating (and distributing to the Allied armed forces) maps and lists of important monuments to be spared during bombing raids. Headquartered principally at the Frick Art Reference Library, which had been involved in the preservation effort as early as 1941, Dinsmoor’s committee was responsible for coordinating information gathered from myriad sources and compiling it into a master index that listed the historic buildings and important works of art in each occupied country. In 1943 the library closed its doors for six months — the only time in its ninety-three-year history that it has done so — in order to support the committee’s research and generate the photography required to prepare more than 700 maps. Even before the end of hostilities, the Frick staff and its resources also played a vital role in the research needed for the recovery of stolen and looted art, which became a top priority of Dinsmoor’s committee and its parent Washington-based Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic and Historic Monuments in Europe. Indeed, even today, researchers — with the help of the Frick Art Reference Library’s vast resources — continue to piece together information to help reunite works of art and their rightful owners.

 The Fine Art Museum of San Francisco is presenting an online Google talk tomorrow:

Milwaukee Police twitter: "Chief Edward Flynn announces arrests of 3 suspects in Stradivarius violin robbery."

At this event I wanted to notify everyone that the Milwaukee Police Department will be seeking charges against three individuals for the January 27th theft and robbery from the concertmaster of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra of his priceless Stradivarius violin. The suspects are a 36-year-old man, a 41-year-old man, and a 32-year-old woman -- all from the city of Milwaukee. They were arrested February 3 and all three remain in our custody. Now the Milwaukee Police Department will continue to work closely with our colleagues in the Federal Bureau of Investigation as well as the District Attorney's Office. We emphasize that at this time, that although we have made arrests, we have not yet recovered the violin... This case came together rapidly in the city of Milwaukee and the leads were followed up with by our detectives who had invaluable help from the FBI, from their art unit as obviously they have a broad perspective. As we continue to search for this violin, I suspect that their assistance will continue to be invaluable. The important thing to stress is that within a week of this case our detectives made an arrest which we believe will result in these individuals being succesfully charged and convicted. Now, as I said, we do not have the violin. As is known, there is a substantial reward out for that violin and we urge the community to do what it can to develop information that can help us identify and locate and recover this priceless instrument.

The “Monuments Men” belonged to the U.S. Army’s Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives section. Their ranks included Lincoln Kirstein ’30, the founder of the New York City Ballet; Paul Sachs, Class of 1900, a member of the American Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic and Historic Monuments in War Areas, which recruited many of the team’s members; and Stout. Born in 1897, Stout was a tall, dashing man with a pencil-thin mustache ­— not unlike actor George Clooney, who in the film plays the Stout-like team leader, Frank Stokes. Clooney also produced and directed the movie and co-wrote the screenplay. Stout helped pioneer the field of art conservation while a graduate assistant at Harvard’s Fogg Art Museum. Long before World War II, he had the vision to see the risk aerial bombing and firebombing posed to art, Edsel said. Stout had spent the early ’40s pushing for a national art conservation plan. The Allies and Stout knew that bombs were hardly the only danger to art. The Nazis engaged in “premeditated, organized looting never before seen in war,” Edsel said. The hunger their leaders displayed for European art put Western treasures at risk.

Other articles to read while you wait for the George Clooney movie on Nazi-looted art and the team of middle-aged art professionals who tried to save Europe's culture:

Anna Goldenberg interviews MM's Harry Ettlinger in The Jewish Daily Forward.

Here is the 2014 schedule for ARCA's Postgraduate Certificate Program in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage to be held in Amelia, Umbria:

May 30 - Students arrive in Amelia
May 31 and June 1 - Program Orientation and City Familiarization

Course I – June 2-4 and June 9-11 “Art Policing, Protection and Investigation”
Richard Ellis, Detective and founder of Scotland Yard’s Art and Antiquities Squad (retired), Art Management Group Director

Course II - June 4-6 and June 11-13 “The International Art Market and Associated Risk”
Dr. Tom Flynn, London Art Lecturer, Docent and Art Historian

Course III - June 16-20 “Transnational Organized Crime and Art”
Dr. Edgar Tijhuis, Lawyer and Assistant Professor of Criminology at the VU University in Amsterdam

Course IV - June 23-27 “Art Forgers and Thieves”
Dr. Noah Charney, Founding Director of ARCA - Adjunct Professor of Art History, American University of Rome

June 27-29, Sixth annual ARCA Art Crime Conference weekend 

Course V - June 30-July 2 and July 7-July 9 “Art Crime in War”
Judge Arthur Tompkins, District Court Judge in New Zealand

Course VI – July 2-4 and July 9-11 “Art and Heritage Law”
To Be Announced

Course VII - July 12 -16 “Risk Assessment and Museum Security”
Dick Drent, Corporate Security Manager, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

July 17-22, Program Break for travel

Course VIII - July 23-25 “Insurance Claims and the Art Trade”
Dorit Straus, Vice President and Worldwide Specialty Fine Art Manager for Chubb & Son, a division of Federal Insurance Company (retired) 

Course IX - July 28-30 and August 4-6 “Unravelling the Hidden Market of Illicit Antiquities: Lessons from Greece and Italy”
Dr. Christos Tsirogiannis, Forensic Archaeologist, Illicit antiquities researcher, University of Cambridge

Course X - July 30-August 1 and August 6-8 “Antiquities and Identity”
Dr. Valerie Higgins, Associate Professor and Chair of Archaeology and Classics at the American University of Rome

August 9-15, 2013 August Palio dei Colombi, Notte Bianca and Ferragosto festivities.

For application information and prospectus please write to education@artcrimeresearch.org.
March 1 is the deadline to apply to the program.

"Artworks lost in Nazi era at the heart of the hunt" by Sam Whiting for the San Francisco Chronicle covers the subject of Elizabeth Rynecki's search for Polish artist Moshe Rynecki's artwork:

When Holocaust survivor George Rynecki died in 1992, he left a war memoir in the trunk of his car, bequeathing the family legacy to his only grandchild, Elizabeth. "It was like, 'Whoosh,' " recalls Elizabeth Rynecki, who is still feeling the blowback of 700 paintings by her great-grandfather that went missing after the war. She set out to find them, a search that has now taken 22 years and may take 22 more. To continue reading this story, you will need to be a digital subscriber to SFChronicle.com.

 Here's an update on the search as published in the ARCA blog.

GILDED BUDDHA HEAD DISCOVERED AT MES AYNAK.  COPYRIGHT © BRENT E. HUFFMAN. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Will Calhoun: Can you give us some background on Mes Aynak? How is the site significant? 

Huffman: I’ve described it as an ancient city of vast size. It was located at a major crossroad on the Silk Road. There are many layers of material. The top layer that archaeologists have done the most work on is a 2,000-year-old Buddhist site that’s over 500,000 square meters in size, or 98 football fields — so an enormous area. There are over 400 life-size or bigger Buddhist statues, ancient manuscripts, temple structures, just a wealth of discoveries and information. The Buddhists were mining for copper using ancient techniques, so archaeologists are really excited about the ancient mining and smelting that was done. Beneath that Buddhist site is a 5,000-year-old or older Bronze Age site, an enormous area filled with this treasure trove of Bronze Age material. 

Calhoun: When was the site first discovered? 

Huffman: That’s sort of when things get complicated. I’m sure the site was known about before this, but the first written evidence that the site was traveled to was in the 1960s by French archaeologists. I don’t know if there was any significant study of the site at the time. The site was left completely unprotected. No protection or way to visit the site was ever put in place, so Mes Aynak has been heavily looted since the 1960s.

The big irony is that when MCC arrived, they were unaware of the Buddhist site, so they signed the contract without knowing of the existence of the site above the copper deposit. When they came in they destroyed a local village to set up their camp, where they are currently staying. Initially they brought in 1,500 Afghan police officers to guard the mining compound and, in addition to guarding the compound, the officers were guarding the site. The Chinese have basically brought in this force that’s now protecting Mes Aynak really for the first time. Since the site is so famous, it is likely that it would be looted again if the Chinese were to leave, so it’s all quite complicated. 

Calhoun: Who is mainly doing the looting? 

Huffman: I would say that it is people from Pakistan who are crossing over, working with local people in Logar province who are very poor, starving to death, and have little employment. Selling these relics, unfortunately, makes sense for local people who have no other prospects. Looters from Pakistan return to the country and sell the relics. 

Calhoun: How has the Afghan government been involved in efforts to preserve the site, if at all? 

Huffman: In my opinion, the Afghan government has been part of the problem. There is massive corruption in the government, especially in the Ministry of Mines. When the deal was first signed in 2007, the rumor was that the minister of mines received a $30 million bribe from MCC. He denied accepting the bribe, but he did step down from his position. I think it is quite likely that he did accept the bribe. He has since been replaced, but I fear the same sorts of allegations of corruption are true within the new Ministry. Obviously they want mining to begin, and they want it to begin as soon as possible. I think the archaeological findings are a thorn in their side, delaying the time when they can extract copper.

[...]

Calhoun: How can people get involved in efforts to preserve Mes Aynak? 

Huffman: There’s a petition on my Facebook page with almost 70,000 signatures, but I think the best thing would be if a celebrity or politician would speak up and say that the US should work to preserve Mes Aynak. I think that would really rally support. I think if we could get hundreds of thousands of signatures — that would really save the site. The dream situation for me would be to save Mes Aynak and do a proper archaeological dig, save everything, and make it a tourist destination. But I think that will only happen with massive public support for the site, and UNESCO would have to come in and assist archaeologists. Sadly, when the Taliban blew up the Buddhas of Bamiyan, people were horrified and shocked and it really rallied them. However, it was too late. My fear is that the same thing will happen with Mes Aynak, that there will be silence until it is destroyed and then there will be outrage. But yes, people can come to my Facebook page and sign the petition. I’ve given money to the Afghan archaeologists to finally buy them computers and digital cameras.  They had been working for years with neither. The Afghan archaeologists are the unsung heroes in this story — they have been working in terrible and dangerous conditions, so people can also donate to the film to help the archaeologists.

 

Here's a link to the Brent E. Huffman's photographs which accompany the article in Fair Observer. 

Noah Charney is featured in “Hunting Hitler’s Stolen Treasures: the Monuments Men,” the documentary tie-in to The Monuments Men Feature Film (Directed by and starring George Clooney). It will be aired on the National Geographic Channel at 8pm Eastern Standard Time on February 5 in the United States.

NGC presents the true story of an unlikely World War II “band of brothers.” The unsuspecting group of scholars, academics, historians and architects headed to the front lines of the bloodiest war in history to rescue thousands of years' worth of European art and culture from Nazi-occupied Europe. Through extensive archive sources and photographs, journals and letter excerpts, along with the personal accounts from surviving family members, this special sheds light on the remarkable story.

From the show's website:

According to Dr. Noah Charney, "while the soldiers were trying to save Europe physically, the Monuments Men were really charged with saving its soul."