Friday, January 23, 2015

5,000 Stolen Vases

Italian police just announced seizing "5,361 vases, kraters, bronze statues and frescoes valued at some 50 million euros" from an art dealer in Switzerland. Lots of illegal digging going on in Italy.


What happens to these objects now? No museum in Italy has room to display them, so I suppose they will disappear into some heavily guarded government warehouse. I have a suggestion: how about organizing them as a traveling exhibit that would visit places like Montana, Manitoba, Costa Rica and Kenya where people don't get to see much classical stuff? Billing them THE STOLEN CLASSICS or LOOT or some such ought to draw in the visitors.


3 comments:

G. Verloren said...

A government warehouse? This is Italy we're talking about - I imagine top ministers will be quietly paying to select choice pieces for their home decor, officially to be marked "Lost or Destroyed In Transit".

pootrsox said...

I think the travelling exhibit is a wonderful idea.

Have to say, though-- that uniform in the image instantly created a "help, NAZIS!" response in me when I saw it. (I know, a lot of that comes from the angle of the photo exaggerating the cap badge.... )

G. Verloren said...

@pootrsox

Really? Because it reminds me an awful lot of various US armed forces uniforms, which I imagine it is either somehow based on or shares common acestors with.