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February 15, 2011

BBC reports Scientists Used Analytical Tools to Study Color Changes Over Time

BBC reports the findings of a study of the deterioration of the color yellow to brown in some of Vincent van Gogh's paintings:
"The researchers found that a change in the oxidation state of the element chromium (from chromium 6 to chromium 3) was linked to the darkening of chrome yellow paint."
For more information, read the complete article ("Van Gogh paintings 'degraded by UV-driven reaction'") on the BBC here.

Photo from the BBC website: Van Gogh's "Banks of the Seine", Oil on canvas, Paris, 1887, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

February 14, 2011

DIA's "Fakes, Forgeries and Mysteries" Podcasts about Painting Attributed to Claude Monet

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin

The Detroit Institute of Arts released its fifth podcast on YouTube, "Hello to Tewkesbury Road" to augment the exhibit, "Fakes, Forgeries, and Mysteries."

Dr. Salvador Salort-Pons, Associate Curator of European Paintings, narrates the story of the painting, "Three Figures Resting Under a Tree," once attributed to Claude Monet. The painting came into the collection at the DIA in 2004 and for this exhibit, the museum decided to look further into the authenticity and provenance of the work. First, Dr. Salort-Pons explains, they conducted a technical analysis of the materials used such as the pigments, the canvas, and the stretcher and found the materials to be consistent with those Monet would have used in 1871, the date attached to the signature on the front of the painting.

The style of the painting did not look like an Impressionist painting by Monet but his signature was on the front and the back of the painting but it is dated from a period when Monet not an Impressionist painter. "He was still young and profiling his artistic personality," Dr. Salort-Pons explains.

They looked at the back of the painting to try to find more information about it, Dr. Salort-Pons continues, and discovered a stamp that said it had been exhibited at the Carnegie Museum of Arts in Pittsburgh. He asked them if they had displayed Monet's "Three Figures Sitting Under a Tree" in the past but they did not find any evidence in their records.

On the back of the painting, they found the number "83707" which they recognized from an art dealer in New York where they traveled and found a card file with the history of ownership of this painting which had been sold by the Parisian dealer Goupil & Cie in the beginning of the 20th century then sold as a painting by Monet in 1947. The card file identified the title of the painting as "Tewkesbury Road."

With this new information, he went through the exhibition files at The Carnegie Museum of Art and found a photo of the painting from an exhibition in 1910 but the artist's signature on the painting was of Sir Alfred East. Apparently, between 1910 and 1947, someone had removed East's signature, forged Monet's signature, and fabricated the provenance. The forger knew in 1871 Monet was in England, the location of Tewkesbury Road. This painting is not by Monet but Sir Alfred East and Dr. Salvort-Pons tells the story of how an art researcher's hopes are challenging while investigating a piece of art.

The Journal of Art Crime: Essayist Kim Alderman on "The Ethics of Context"

In an essay titled “The Ethics of Context: Exploring Assumptions in Discussions about the Looting of Archaeological Sites,” Kim Alderman explores “underlying assumptions in arguments that increased regulation of the antiquities trade will combat the looting crisis, thereby preserving archaeological context:”

“The essay first distinguishes between ethical and legal arguments regarding illicit excavation of archaeological materials. The essay next considers whether archaeological context is “ethically worthy” because it helps people discover their past, or whether it is simple information to be commodified. Finally, the essay compares the ethical worth of context versus the immediate, palpable needs of subsistence looters.”

Kimberly Alderman is a Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School. She recently completed the ARCA Postgraduate Program, and writes a blog: http://culturalpropertylaw.wordpress.com/.

To seek out this piece, and many others, consider a subscription to the Journal of Art Crime—the first peer-reviewed academic journal covering art and heritage crime. ARCA publishes two volumes annually in the Spring and Fall. Individual, Institutional, electronic and printed versions are all available, with subscriptions as low as 30 Euros. All proceeds go to ARCA's nonprofit research and education initiatives. Please see the publications page for more information.

February 13, 2011

Amelia, Umbria: An Introduction to Its History

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin

Amelia, the oldest town in Umbria, is about 60 miles north of Rome. You can get there by car in about an hour. You could get there by train to the station at Orte, in either one or two hours from either Termini Station in Rome or from the airports, depending on whether or not your train stops at every town. Orte, a another small medieval town, is about nine miles from Amelia through beautiful green hills with cypress trees. If you don't have a car, you can take a bus, unless you arrive on a Sunday in July or August, or later than 10 o'clock at night, then you will have to call for a driver. Outside the doors of the train station, a sign indicates a phone number for a taxi company. But the taxi company, or just a sole driver, I've never figured out which, does not always answer the phone or send a car. So it's helpful to have the name and number of a private service that will agree to meet you upon your arrival for the cost of 25 or 30 euros.

As I've discussed before, most visitors stop at Bar Leonardi for refreshments or to make arrangements to reach their lodgings. From the patio of Bar Leonardi, you can sit at a table and view the walls of the medieval town and the main gate which is known as the Porta Romana. This entrance deserves a photo and a blog of it's own so we'll just say for now that if you're not waiting on the patio of Bar Leonardi, you're waiting on a low wall that extends outside of the Porta Romana. And I have a photo which I will also show in another blog of some local men that agreed to have their photo taken. They, or someone like them, sat on that wall most morning and evenings. However, the sitting wall is typically available during the afternoon siesta so I recommend that when you want to feel like a local and check out all the cars and pedestrians going in and out of the historic center, that you first sit on the wall during a hot afternoon when no one else is around. Because you'll want to make sure you have the right detached pose ready as you inspect everyone and everything going in and out of that town.

People may have lived on this hilltop for three thousand years, allegedly beginning with the Umbrian King Ameroe more than 300 years earlier than the settlement of Rome. The Umbrians traded with Greeks and Etruscans and produced pottery. Pliny the Elder, historian and military commander, wrote that the Umbrians were the oldest people in Italy -- that the Greeks called them 'Ombrici' because they were believed to have survived the great flood Zeus unleashed to cleanse the countryside at the end of the Bronze Age to express his anger with the corruption of the Pelasgians. This history is relevant when you're in Amelia because you can feel the sense of pride and tradition in the town's clean streets and well-preserved buildings.

Between the 6th and 4th centuries B. C., the Etruscans protected Amelia by stacking limestone blocks, one on top of the other, fitting them together without mortar. These walls, 8 meters high and 3.5 meters wide, extend around the town for more than 700 meters. One legend claims that these walls thwarted an attack by Emperor Federico Barbarossa. A 30-meter segment of this wall collapsed in 2006 and is still under repair as the town awaits for government funding and tries to figure out how to duplicate the original construction. In May 2008, another gate opening from the third of fourth century B.C. was rediscovered.

February 12, 2011

Amelia, Umbria: Bronze Germanicus Home in Museo Archeologico di Amelia

By Catherine Schofield Sezgin

Of the most important and complete bronze statues of the first century A.D. ever found in Italy resides in Amelia.

In 1963, outside the walls of Amelia’s historic center, a group of workers digging a mill found the broken remains of a first century bronze statue. Over the town’s objections, the fragments were transferred to Perugia, restored, and then decades later returned to Amelia to an archaeological museum built to display the bronze of Germanicus Julius Caesar.

Francesca Rossi, an Amelian and daughter of Luciano Rossi of Punto Di Vino, a local wine bistro, recalled seeing the restored head of Germanicus on display in the old town hall when she was a little girl. “I fell in love with him,” she said. “I told my mother I wanted to marry him.”

The charisma of the bronze head likely belonged to a statue created to commemorate the early death of one of the Roman Empire’s most beloved commanders. Germanicus, adopted younger son of Julius Augustus, would have followed his brother Tiberius as Roman emperor if he had not been poisoned in Antioch.

Austrialian-born writer Stephen Dando-Collins claims in his book “Blood of the Caesars: How the Murder of Germanicus Led to the Fall of Rome” (John Wiley and Sons, 2008), that the death of Germanicus in A. D. 19 predated the fall of the Roman Empire. But Germanicus’ fame catapulted his son Caligula and his grandson Nero to the throne. It was his wife Agrippina the Elder, the granddaughter of Augustus, who used her husband’s good name and affection of the people of the Roman Empire to further her family’s political ambitions. Yet, it was Germanicus’ lack of political ambition, his unwillingness to use his popularity to unseat Tiberius, that may have motivated his wife and her reputed lover and one of Rome’s greatest philosophers, Seneca, to poison her husband, according to Dando-Collins’ book.

Ruthless women characterized Germanicus’ family. His paternal grandmother had been six months pregnant when she divorced her husband and married his political rival, the future Roman Emperor, bestowing upon her great wealth and ultimately the title of Roman deity. Women used marriage and motherhood as the only available political tools. Although his grandmother’s mother had been the daughter of a magistrate, her father was from two patrician families, Gens Julia and Gens Claudia, of Ancient Rome.

At the age of 14, Livia Drusilla married her cousin Tiberius Claudius Nero, an ally of Mark Antony and Julius Caesar. For years she lived in exile before a peace agreement between Antony and Octavian in 40 BC allowed her family to return to Rome. Apparently, Octavian, her husband’s rival, fell in love with the pregnant 20-year-old Livia, divorced his wife Scribonia the day after she gave birth to her daughter Julia, and then married Germanicus’ paternal grandmother. Three months later, Livia gave birth to Germanicus’ father, Drusus. She allowed her first husband to raise her sons until his death and then they went to live with their mother and her husband who was elevated to Augustus, first Roman Emperor.

Germanicus’ maternal grandmother was Augustus’ sister, Octavia, and his maternal grandfather was Augustus' rival Mark Antony. When Antony took up with Cleopatra, then committed suicide, one of the nine children he left behind was Germanicus’ mother, Antonia the Younger. Thus, Germanicus’ grandparents were the second wife of the first Roman Emperor, the sister of the first Roman Emperor, and two political rivals of the first Roman Emperor.

Germanicus’ wife, Agrippina the Elder, was the granddaughter of the First Roman Emperor through his daughter Julia who had been abandoned by her father Octavian when he married Germanicus’ maternal grandmother Livia. Agrippina’s father, of course, was Agrippa, a political ally of Julia’s father. After her father died, her mother married Tiberius Caesar, Germanicus’ uncle and the ruler to succeed Augustus.

Germanicus, adopted by Tiberius at the will of Augustus, was patiently waiting his turn when his wife, the direct descendant of Augustus, grew impatient and plotted to poison her husband at the age of 34 so as to undermine Tiberius and raise her son to the imperial throne.

When the pieces of a bronze statue were dug up outside the city walls along the “Via Ortana”, probably the ancient road that follows the route of the Via Amerina, likely on the grounds for the old campus for ancient games and gymnastic competitions. (Archaeological Museum of Amelia, website). The statue was erected in honor of Amelia and in memory of Germanicus, also known as Nero Claudius Drusus, born in 15 BC. Germanicus, the son of a famed and beloved commander who succeeded in the Germany territories and also died young, on his horse, also earned adulation of the Roman people.

The bronze fragments were reconstructed with the use of steel frame that was anchored to a wooden structure to support the basis for the bronze fragments.

The statue, more than two meters tall, is of a “Young Germanicus” triumphant as a victorious general, with armor and the arm resting on a spear, the head turned to the right, in the direction of the raised arm.

The artistic decoration of his armor shows the scene of the attack of Achilles in Troy, perhaps linking this memory with Germanicus’ military operations in the East.

The archaeological museum is located in the Boccarini Palazzo built between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries. In 1410, it was the seat of the papal government whose jurisdiction included Amelia, Orvieto, and Terni.

http://www.umbriaearte.it/museo_archeologico_amelia.htm
Museo Archeologico di Amelia
Piazza Augusto Vera, 10 - Amelia (Tr)
Tel./fax+39.0744.978120

February 10, 2011

The Journal of Art Crime: Essayist Christopher A. Marinello from the Art Loss Register "On Fakes"

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin

In the fourth issue of The Journal of Art Crime, Christopher A. Marinello discusses the Art Loss Register’s response to the proliferation of forgeries in the art market in an editorial essay titled “On Fakes”.

Christopher A. Marinello had been a litigator in the criminal and civil courts in New York for more than 20 years before joining the Art Loss Register (ALR) as General Counsel. Chris has represented galleries, dealers, artists and collectors and is currently managing all U. S. and worldwide art recovery cases for the London-based Art Loss Register, the largest international database of stolen, missing and looted artwork used by law enforcement agencies, the insurance industry, the art market, museums, and private collectors who can commission pre-sale due diligence checks and fine art recovery services. Chris serves as the ALR’s chief negotiator and has mediated and settled countless art related disputes as well as several high profile Holocaust Restitution claims. He is often asked by law enforcement to take part in clandestine art recovery operations and has participated in numerous international conferences on stolen art. Chris has taught Law & Ethics in the Art Market at New York University SCPS, Seton Hall University and Sotheby’s Institute of Art, Masters Degree Program and is a member of Advisory council of the Appraisers Association of America and Inland Marine Underwriter’s Association.

ARCA blog: In your essay, you say that fake and fraudulent artwork being sold in the market place is at the top of the agenda for dealers and collectors. The Art Loss Register has compiled a Fakes Database. How long has this service been in place and how would you describe the size of the Fakes Database?
Mr. Marinello: "The sheer number of fake and fraudulent works is astounding. We are currently compiling records and resources from law enforcement worldwide as well as dealer associations, collector groups, artist authentication boards and committees as well as other sources. We have been working on this project for several years now and fully expect the numbers to overtake those for stolen art."
ARCA blog: You write that The Art Loss Register is open to technological advances in location devices and authentication methods but still relies upon the “keen eye of an educated expert and the diligent provenance research performed by trained art historians.” Do you see any changes in how connoisseurship is being applied today?
Mr. Marinello: "Today’s art historians are certainly taking advantage of advances in technology. The point I want to make is that despite these advances, there is no substitute for a well trained art historian. Computers cannot replicate the skill necessary to perform proper due diligence and provenance research. I applaud the ARCA program for educating the already well educated and stressing the importance of academic analysis."
To seek out this piece, and many others, consider a subscription to the Journal of Art Crime—the first peer-reviewed academic journal covering art and heritage crime. ARCA publishes two volumes annually in the Spring and Fall. Individual, Institutional, electronic and printed versions are all available, with subscriptions as low as 30 Euros. All proceeds go to ARCA's nonprofit research and education initiatives. Please see the publications page for more information.

Photo: Raphaelllo Sanzio's "Portrait of A Young Man." Mr. Marinello was asked to provide an image for this blog post and he chose Raphael's painting, formerly exhibited at the Czartoryski Museum, Kraków, Poland, and missing since 1945 when it was stolen by the Nazis, making it one of the most important paintings lost during the war.

February 9, 2011

Amelia, Umbria: An Eyewitness Account Recalls the Allied Bombing of Amelia in 1944

By Francesca Rossi, Guest Contributor

During the World War II, people in Amelia felt quite safe from the fighting because there was no reason for them to suppose Amelia would be considered a military target. But they were wrong. On the 25th of January in 1944, on a beautiful winter day in Amelia, no one could have predicted what would happen that morning, especially not Umberto Cerasi who at the time was just a young boy. In his book “Amelia – Un anno di storia dal 25 luglio 1943 al 13 giugno 1944: ricordi, testimonianze, documenti”, Mr. Cerasi tells us also about that day (translated from the Italian):
“I remember that morning because I was there and because you can’t forget those kind of facts. I was an apprentice at a typography studio nearby the Public Gardens and I was working when I heard the sound of the warning siren located on the top of the Cathedral bell tower. I started to run, trying to find a shelter, but I could already hear the rumble of the B-29 and when I looked up, I saw the training aircraft above me. There was a weird twinkle under the fuselage: cluster bombs were being dropped over us!”

“The bombs exploded on the ancient polygonal walls and again on Via Cavour hitting the elementary girl’s school, the church of Saint Elisabetta, the house of the parish, a house owned by Mr. Ammaniti, and other nearby houses. It was a massacre! An unknown number of people were severely injured and twenty-six people died including the Director of Education Ms. Iole Orsini, twelve little girls and three nuns. It was terrible!”
“When the explosions stopped, I could hear only people crying. So I came back home, actually hoping to still find my home and terrified not to find my family anymore. Fortunately there it was, and so was my mother and my father. Then I reached Via Cavour, the most damaged area, and as I approached the area I could realize the magnitude of the tragedy: parents holding in their arms the little girls who had been in the school, with tattered clothes and faces covered in white dust. There were a lot of people in front of heaps of rubble from where dead bodies were beginning to be extracted. I was just a kid but I could realize my presence was a hindrance, so I went away with my eyes full of tears and my heart pounding in my chest."
No one ever knew the real reason for this act of war: there are different hypotheses but the most probable is that it was just a tragic mistake in the attempt to hit the bridge on the nearby Rio Grande. What we know is that on January 25, 1944, all those innocent people died and since then, every year, everyone in Amelia attends Mass in the church of Santa Lucia, built on the ruins of Santa Elisabetta, to commemorate the 26 victims:

Orsini Iole, 40 years old: Director of Education
Bertini Quinta, 25 years old – Sister (nun and religious educator)
Bolli Teresa, 74 years old- Sister
Martini Jolanda, 23 years old – Sister
Paolocci Fiorella, 10 years old – schoolgirl
Ciancuto Graziella, 10 years old – schoolgirl
Silvani Paola, 6 years old – schoolgirl
Fiorucci Maria Teresa, 12 years old – schoolgirl
Barcherini Graziella, 7 years old – schoolgirl
Lanfaloni Consiglia, 10 years old – schoolgirl
Proietti Rosella, 6 years old – schoolgirl
Suadoni Geltrude, 11 years old – schoolgirl
Proietti Palmira, 10 years old – schoolgirl
Botarelli Maria, 12 years old – schoolgirl
Corvi Fedina, 8 years old – schoolgirl
Marzoli Rossana, 4 years old – schoolgirl
Servi Nazzareno, 67 years old – worker
Esposito Pasquale, 28 years old – worker
Grisci David, 68 years old – farmer
Castellani Emilia, 54 years old – housewife
Tinarelli Castorino, 36 years old – worker
Grilli Enzo, 13 years old – apprentice
Quadraccia Ferrero, 14 years old – apprentice
Margheriti Gregorio, 64 years old – shoemaker
Fabrizi Agenore, 39 years old – farmer
Olivieri Palmira, 77 years old - housewife

(Source: “AMELIA – UN ANNO DI STORIA DAL 25 LUGLIO 1943 AL 13 GIUGNO 1944: ricordi, testimonianze, documenti” di Umberto Cerasi)

Francesca Rossi will be writing about the history and culture of Amelia as a guest writer for the ARCA blog. Ms. Rossi graduated from the Universitá degli Studi di Siena in Arezzo with a degree in biomedical laboratory techniques. She is an interior designer and responsible for the identify brand for an interior design studio in Amelia. Although born in Terni, Francesca was raised in Amelia, the summer base for ARCA's Postgraduate Certificate Program in Art Crime and Cultural Heritage Protection.

Amelia, Umbria: Rosa Venerini's Schools and a WWII Tragic Bombing

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin

February 9 is the anniversary of the birthday of the 17th century educator who has a school named after her in Amelia. A statue of Rose Venerini on a walkway of a small school in Amelia commemorates the founder of public schools for Italian girls more than 350 years ago. Rose opened forty schools from 1685 to 1728, including one at the foot of the Campidoglio, the smallest and most famous of Rome’s Seven Hills. The motto of the Maestre Pie Venerini is “Educate to save.” Nearby a plaque memorializes the Allied bombing of this school on January 25, 1944, which killed students, teachers, and residents of a nearby house. The Allies missed an ammunitions factor in nearby Terni, and that morning, innocent people died. The bomb also destroyed the church of Santa Elisabetta. Parishioners constructed a new church, Santa Lucia, on the site in 1956.

The Journal of Art Crime: Essayist Simon Cole on Connoisseurship

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin

In one of ARCA’s three scholarly responses to David Grann’s “The Mark of a Masterpiece,” published in The New Yorker in July 2010, Simon A. Cole penned an editorial essay, “Connoisseurship All the Way Down: Art Authentication, Forgery, Fingerprint Identification, Expert Knowledge” in the fourth issue of The Journal of Art Crime (Fall 2010).

Simon A. Cole is Associate Professor & Chair of the Department of Criminology, Law, and Society at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Suspect Identities: A History of Fingerprinting and Criminal Identification (Harvard University Press, 2001) and Truth Machine: The Contentious History of DNA Fingerprinting (University of Chicago Press, 2008, with Michael Lynch, Ruth McNally & Kathleen Jourdan). His work has been published in numerous criminology journals, Art Journal, and Suspect (MIT Press, 2005), the 10th issue of the design award winning series Alphabet City. He is co-editor of the journal Theoretical Criminology.

ARCA blog: Professor Cole, if you were given a Caravaggio painting to authenticate, would you trust an art historian or a forensic art expert? Would your preference for the type of expert change if the painting was a 20th century Van Gogh or a 21st century Jackson Pollock?
Professor Cole: I don’t think the point I was making would change based on the period of the painting. But the point I was making was that we can’t really know whom to trust! Certainly, there is an appeal to thinking “science” is preferable to “I know it when I see it” connoisseurship. But, there’s also an appeal to thinking that only an art historian can evaluate all the evidence in all its complexity. And, much of forensic science turns out to essentially be “I know it when I see it” as well (which doesn’t necessarily mean it’s wrong).
ARCA blog: In your essay, you compare art “connoisseurship” with the art – not the science – of identifying fingerprints. Would you have the same level of doubt about the authenticity of a painting’s creator based on the identification of a fingerprint as you would the guilt or innocent of a murderer identified by a “fingerprint expert”?
Professor Cole: Yes! In both cases, the fingerprint attribution would be a valuable piece of evidence. But one would also have to consider the possibility that the attribution is erroneous, which it could be due to a variety of causes (such as fraud, unintentional error, and the possibility of another individuals with very similar friction ridge detail). One would then have to consider this evidence in conjunction with all the other relevant evidence.
To seek out this piece, and many others, consider a subscription to the Journal of Art Crime—the first peer-reviewed academic journal covering art and heritage crime. ARCA publishes two volumes annually in the Spring and Fall. Individual, Institutional, electronic and printed versions are all available, with subscriptions as low as 30 Euros. All proceeds go to ARCA's nonprofit research and education initiatives. Please see the publications page for more information.

Wednesday, February 09, 2011 - ,,, No comments

Dr. Tom Flynn Talks to ARCA about his most recent blog post concerning the French auction house scandal and the future of the art market

by Catherine Schofield Sezgin

ARCA lecturer, art historian, and journalist Dr. Tom Flynn out of England published his first post of the year on "artknows" about the French auction house scandal and his recent trip to Paris. Always passionate and outspoken, Dr. Flynn graciously answered via email my question about how this scandal will play against the future of the French art market.
Dr. Flynn: French commentators say the process of reform following the Drouot/Savoyard portering scandal has already begun, with investigations in train and potential criminal prosecutions on the horizon. Meanwhile, a new logistics company has been recruited to handle the Drouot's portering, transport and storage services previously conducted by the disgraced cols rouges. Quite how those illegal processes were allowed to take root deep inside in the country's ancient auction nerve centre, and continue unchecked for decades, remains the great unanswered question.

But let's not forget that the international art market has always been amenable to corruption at every level. Look at the Italian antiquities scandal uncovered by Peter Watson. Look at the Sotheby's and Christie's price-fixing scandal. Fakes and forgeries and manufactured provenances abound. Blind eyes are everywhere.

Beyond the Drouot, the French auction scene is still undergoing the slow process of rationalisation following the opening of the auction market to Sotheby's, Christie's and other non-French companies in 2001. That will take time to shake out, but some might argue that it was too little too late and that France long ago lost the battle of the gavels, while London and New York exploited the freedom and latitude of their own unregulated markets. Some analysts claim that Paris is no longer even in third place after London and New York and that Beijing is now the third largest art market centre and expanding at a rate of knots.

That said, new Parisian auction business ventures such as Artcurial, which have taken advantage of external investment made available following the partial relaxation of government regulations, are providing the sort of competition the French art auction market badly needs. Meanwhile, French dealers and collectors are tapping into an increasingly global market, buying and selling in the most commercially favourable centres, whether it be New York, London or Beijing.

The Drouot scandal notwithstanding, Paris still has a lot going for it in the art market stakes. It's a beautiful city with an ancient artistic heritage and a noble tradition of art commerce. Fashionable international contemporary art dealerships are opening all the time in the city's chic quarters around the Marais and in the Avenue Matignon. If it can deal rapidly and effectively with the cols rouges scandal and the recent, highly publicized allegations against the Wildenstein dealership, then perhaps it will turn the page and once again compete on the world stage. The next several months will be critical.
Photo: Colette Marvin and Tom Flynn recently toured art auction houses in Paris.