"Translation for Writers" with poets Ann Cefola and Ann Lauinger, and art historian Beth Gersh-Nesic, Sunday, February 24th at 4 pm, Bronx River Books

Translation for Writers

at

Bronx River Books

37 Spencer Place, Scarsdale, NY 10583

Sunday, February 24^th at 4 pm.

info@bronxriverbooks.com

Did you take a second language in school but never had much use for it? Even if you know a minimum of another language, you can enrich your own writing and publishing credits through literary translation. Learn about the many opportunities in the growing field of global literature. We share it all: the Good, the Bad, and the Transcendent.   Come join us!

Ann Cefola – Poet and author of Free Ferry (Upper Hand Press, 2017) and Face Painting in the Dark (Dos Madres, 2014); translator of The Hero (Chax Press, 2018) and Hence This Cradle (Seismicity Editions, 2007); recipient of the Robert Penn Warren Award.

 

Ann Lauinger – Professor of Literature, Sarah Lawrence College; poet and author of Persuasions of Fall (The University of Utah Press, 2004) and Against Butterflies (Little Red Tree Publishing, 2013); translator of Pierre Ronsard and Filippo Naitana; and recipient of Agha Shahid Ali Poetry and Ernest J Poetry Prizes. Beth Gersh-Nešić – Director of the New York Arts Exchange, art historian, author with the poet Jean-Luc Pouliquen of Transatlantic Conversation About Poetry and Art (CreateSpace, 2018), translator of André Salmon on French Art (Cambridge University Press, 2005), and contributing writer to BonjourParis.com and Smarthistory.  She teaches art history at the College of New Rochelle. Looking forward to seeing you there, Beth New York aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D. Director and owner New York Arts Exchange www.nyarts-exchange.com

Last Call: "Posing Modernity: The Black Model from Manet and Matisse to Today," through Feb. 10th -extended hours Sat. and Sun.

Édouard Manet, La négresse (Portrait of Laure), 1863. 

Oil on canvas, 24 × 19-11/16 in. (61 × 50 cm). 

Collection Pinacoteca Giovanni e Marella Agnelli, Turino.

Photo: Andrea Guerman, © Pinacoteca

Giovanni e Marella Agnelli, Turino.

Posing Modernity: The Black Model from Manet and Matisse to Today, on view in the Wallach Art Gallery on Columbia University's new Manhattanville Campus, explores a topic in art history that has been sorely neglected. Despite scores of scholarly writing on works of art that feature black models as maids, nannies, and slaves, art historians have often failed to describe the iconography of the women of color in these scenes.  Posing Modernity corrects this implicit racism and then goes further to explain the meaning of black women in art from mid 19th century through 21st century art.  Over 100 objects loaned from 40 international collections by white and black artists depict the image of black women in paintings, sculpture, drawings, photography, and film. The curator Denise Murrell, Ph.D. centers her thesis on the concept that the black model became a marker of modernity during the emergence of modern art in the 19th century and 20th century, particularly in the work of Edouard Manet and Henri Matisse. To underscore this analysis, the curator included contemporary works that appropriate Edouard Manet's Olympia (1863) and other contemporaneous images of 19th century black models.

In Manet's masterpiece, we see the model Laure, posing as the courtesan's maid. The Portrait of Laure, rarely seen outside of its Italian collection, demonstrates the notion of "modernity" described by this exhibition. Here the image of a woman of color comes alive through Manet's new technique of quick strokes and reduced contours. Her multicolor turban exoticizes her identity, while her clothes describe a Parisian in contemporary society. She is part of the modern city that brings people from different countries together in cosmopolitan centers thanks to the industrial revolution. For more information about the model Laure, please read my article for Bonjour Paris.  There is also copious scholarly material in the sumptuous exhibition catalog for the Wallach Art Gallery exhibition.

Édouard Manet, Baudelaire’s Mistress(Portrait of Jeanne Duval), 1862. 

Oil oncanvas, 35-7/16 × 44-1/2 in. (90 × 113 cm). 

Museum of Fine Arts (Szépművészeti Múzeum), Budapest. 

Photo: CsanádSzesztay, 

© The Museum of Fine Arts Budapest/Scala / Art Resource, New York.

We also learn about black women who belonged to higher ranks of society though birth or celebrity.  The Haitian actress Jeanne Duval, known as the inspiration for many of Charles Baudelaire's poems, was a Creole mixture of French and black ancestry. Her stormy relationship with the poet lasted on and off for 20 years. In this portrait by Baudelaire's close friend Manet, we may see the signs of degeneration from syphilis, which caused Baudelaire's death in 1867. Some sources claim she died as early as 1862 (the year of this portrait) or as late as 1870.  The strange dark marks that represent her eyes may refer to her blindness at the end of her life.

Frédéric Bazille, Young Woman with Peonies, 1870. 

Oil on canvas, 23-5/8 × 29-9/16 in. (60 × 75 cm). 

National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 

Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon. 

Image courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Frédéric Bazille's Young Woman with Peonies (1870) captures the greeting of a flower vendor.  She holds her peony out to us in order to engage our attention. Bazille died during the Franco-Prussian War later this year.  His work reminds us of the early days of Impressionism, before their first major exhibition in 1874, with its lush vivid colors redolent with sunshine from his native Montpellier.  Here a young woman who seems to come from the Caribbean, suggests the changing landscape of modern commerce, as people from all walks of life came to France in order to make a new life through self-made entrepreneurship.  Again, the model wears modern French dress and an exoticizing scarf on her head.

Edgar Degas, Miss Lala at the Fernando Circus, 1879.

 Pastel on paper, 18-1/4 × 11-3/4 in. (46.4 × 29.8 cm).

 J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. 

Courtesy the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Calif.

Miss Lala was Anna Olga Albertine Brown, born in Stettin, Prussia (in today's Poland), on April 28, 1858.  Therefore in Degas's painting Miss La La at the Fernando Circus (1879), she was only 21.  An acrobat, trapeze artist and "female cannon," Miss La La acquired an international reputation for her astounding feats, most notably hanging from high above the audience dangling from a rope she held in her teeth.  Miss La La was also known as Anna Kaire or Ogla Kaire. She married the American contortionist Emmanuel Woodson in 1888.  The couple had 3 daughters and developed the act The Three Keziahs. The last record from her life is an application for a US passport in 1919. 

Henri Matisse, Creole Dancer, 1950

Paper on paper, 205 x 120 cm.

 Musée Matisse, Nice

Source: Wikiart Fair Use

From the galleries that feature 19th century paintings, sculpture and photography, we move on to numerous paintings and drawings by Henri Matisse, crowned by a superb collage entitled Creole Dancer (1950), which may refer to African-American modern dancer Katherine Dunham.  

Charles Alston, Girl in a Red Dress, 1934.

Oil on canvas, 28 × 22 in. (71.1 × 55.9 cm). 

Collection Harmon and Harriet Kelley Foundation for the Arts, San Antonio.

In the same galleries with Matisse, we find the 20th-century American black models interpreted by modernist African-American artists. Two contemporaries, William H Johnson (1901-1970) and Charles Alston (1907-1977) were born in North Carolina and moved to New York in their youth during the Great Migration.  They both became part of the art scene in New York but in different African-American contexts.  Johnson became part of the Harmon Foundation which supported African-American art through its award for distinction within the African-American community.  The Harmon Foundation also arranged for exhibitions.  Alston refused to become a part of this organization, because he considered it a form of segregation.  He became the first African-American instructor at the Art Students League in 1950, remaining there through 1971, and he exhibited in numerous exhibitions, including a group show in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1950. His first solo exhibition took place at John Heller Gallery in 1953. He founded Spiral with his cousin Romare Bearden and Hal Woodruff in 1963, a group that addressed segregation in contemporary American society.  Alston's Girl in a Red Dress (1934) may be a portrait of Bessie Smith, whom he drew several times.  His murals, financed by the WPA, are still on view in Harlem Hospital.  Other murals were created for Golden State Mutual, the American Museum of Natural History, Public School 154, The Bronx Family and Criminal Court, and Abraham Lincoln High School in Brooklyn.

William H. Johnson, Portrait of Woman with Blue and White Striped Blouse, ca. 1940–42. 

Tempera on paperboard, 28 × 22-1/16 in. (71.1 × 56.0 cm). 

Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C., 

Gift of the Harmon Foundation.

Image courtesy Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.

William H. Johnson enjoyed the heyday of the Harlem Renaissance and knew numerous major artists, white and African-American, throughout his active career.  He left New York in 1927 to study in Paris, then in the South of France.  There he met a Danish artist, Holcha Krake (1885-1944), whom he married in 1930, after returning to the US in 1929 and deciding to settle in Denmark in 1930.  In 1947, grieving from the loss of  Holcha, who died of breast cancer, his erratic behavior was diagnosed as syphilis-induced paresis. Sent back the the US, he spent the last 20 years of his life in Central Islip State Hospital. In his Portrait of a Woman with Blue and White Striped Blouse, Johnson demonstrated the influence of the School of Paris, particularly his appreciation for Matisse and Amedeo Modigliani.

Posing Modernity: The Black Model from Manet to Matisse to Today is one of the best exhibitions of 2018.  Please note that the Wallach Art Gallery is located on Broadway at 125th Street, on an angle with 129th.  They have extended their hours on Saturday and Sunday to 8 pm. The gallery is easy to find when taking the #1 Subway to 125th St.  Parking can be found in the area either in parking lots or on the street. In the case of the latter, later in the day may be the best time to find a spot.

Next month, Posing Modernity moves to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris to become part of Black Models from Géricault to Matisse (March 26-July 21, 2019).

Happy 2019 - Last call for top exhibitions closing in January

Dear friends,

Wishing you joy, good health and peace of mind in the new year!

Here are my top choices for the exhibitions closing in January:

"Everything is Connected," Met Breuer, closing January 6

Delacroix, Metropolitan Museum on 5th, closing January 6

Tintoretto, Pontormo, and "Frankenstein," Morgan Library, closing January 6

Current exhibition, Scandinavia House, closing January 12

Charles White, Museum of Modern Art, closing January 13

Architecture in Yugoslavia, post WWII, Museum of Modern Art, closing January 13

Yasumasa Morimuri, Japan Society, closing January 13

Jan van Eyck, The Charter House at Bruges, Frick Collection, closing January 13

 August Macke and Franz Marc, Neuegalerie, closing January 21

Lillian Porter, El Museo del Barrio, closing January 27

Harry Potter, NY Historical Society, closing January 27

Cheers!

Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director and owner

New York Arts Exchange

www.nyarts-exchange.com 

Yuletide Greetings with a Christmas Quiz for YOU!

Sandro Botticelli, The Nativity, c. 1473-5

Season's Greetings and Merry Christmas to all who celebrate Christ's birthday on December 25, 2018!

And for everyone, whether you celebrate Christmas on December 25th of the Gregorian calendar or the Julian calendar (January 7th on the Common calendar) or not at all, here are four masterpieces that tell the story of Christ's birth with a New York question for you: 

Which work of art comes from the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection?

Robert Campin, The Merode Altarpiece, c. 1426-7

Pontormo, The Visitation, c. 1528-29

George de la Tour, The Nativity, 1644

Peter Paul Rubens, The Adoration of the Magi, c. 1609-10

(Stumped?  Click on the captions to discover the answer.)

May your Holiday Week be Merry and Bright!
Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.
Director and owner
New York Arts Exchange
www.nyarts-exchange.com

Holiday Season 2018 - The Must-See Exhibitions Closing Soon!

Met Museum's Annual Christmas Tree with Neapolitan Baroque Crèche

T'is the season to be jolly, naughty and nice, especially in the numerous museums and galleries that enrich our New York -centric lives. Please note that most of the exhibitions on this list will close in January 2019.  

Jan van Eyck and Workshop, Virgin and Child with St. Barbara, St. Elizabeth and Jan Vos, 1441-43

Frick Collection:

The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus, and Jan Vos, closing January 13, 2019

Eugène Delacroix, Self-Portrait, 1837

Metropolitan Museum of Art: 

Crowns of the Vajra Masters: Ritual Art from Nepal, closing December 16, 2018

Delacroix, closing January 6, 2019

Armenia!, closing January 13, 2019

Celebrating Tintoretto, closing January 27, 2019

Metropolitan Museum of Art - Breuer:

Everything is Connected: Art and Conspiracy, closing January 6

Neue Galerie:

August Macke and Franz Marc, closing January 21, 2019

Hilma af Klint, installation at the Guggenheim

Guggenheim Museum:

Hilma af Klint, closing April 23, 2019

The Jewish Museum:

Chagall, Lissitzky and Malevich, closing January 6, 2019

Martha Rosler, closing March 3, 2019

The Museum of the City of New York:

Stanley Kubrick, closing January 6, 2019

Rebel Women, closing January 6, 2019

El Museo del Barrio:

Liliana Porter, closing January 27, 2019

Frédéric Bazille, Young Woman with Peonies, 1870

Wallach Art Gallery, Columbia University -

Manhattanville Campus, Broadway and 125th Street:

Posing Modernity: The Black Model from Manet and Matisse to Today, closing February 10, 2019

Listen to an interview with the curator Denise Murrell, Ph.D. on "All of It," WNYC.

Studio Museum of Harlem: closed for renovation. 

Maren Hassinger Monuments in Marcus Garvey Park, 127th Street

New-York Historical Society:

Harry Potter, through January 27, 2019

Billie Jean King, through January 27, 2019

Black Citizenship in the Age of Jim Crow, through March 3, 2019

Betye Saar, through May 27, 2019

American Museum of Natural History:

Ou Senses: An Immersive Experience, closing January 2, 2019

Museum of Modern Art:

Bodys Isek Kingelez, closing January 1, 2019

Charles White, closing January 13, 2019

Architecture in Yugoslavia, closing January 13, 2019

Bruce Nauman, closing February 2019 - at MoMA Manhattan and P.S. 1

Judson Dance Theater, closing February 3, 2019

Brancusi, closing February 18, 2019

Jacopo da Pontormo, Visitation, 1528-29

Morgan Library and Museum:

Tintoretto's Venice, closing January 6, 2019

Pontormo, closing January 6, 2019

Frankenstein at 200, closing January 6, 2019

Scandinavia House:

Jan Groth, Inger Johanne Grytting, and Thomas Pihl, closing January 12, 2019

Yasumasa Morimura, Portrait (Futago), 1988

Japan Society:

Yasumasa Morimura, closing January 13, 2019

Asia Society:

Modern Art for a New India, closing January 20, 2019

Whitney Museum:

Andy Warhol, closing March 31, 2019

Ukrainian Museum:

Andy Warhol, closing February 17, 2019

New Museum:

Sarah Lucas, closing January 20, 2019

Center for Modern Italian Art:

Metaphysical Masterpieces 1916-1920: Morandi, Sironi and Carrà, closing June 15, 2019

Toyin Ojih Odutola, Paris Apartment, 2016-17

The Drawing Center:

Elijah Burgher, Toyin Ojih Odutola, and Nathaniel Mary Quinn, through February 3, 2019

Michael Rosenfeld Gallery:

Norman Lewis, closing January 27, 2019

Galerie St. Etienne:

Egon Schiele, closing March 2, 2019 

(Gallery closed December 21, 2018-January 1, 2019)

Bruce Museum, Greenwich, CT:

Small-Scale Sculpture, closing January 27, 2019

Hudson Valley Museum of Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY:

Death is Irrelevant, closing August 2, 2019

Hudson River Museum,Yonkers, NY:

Maya Lin, closing January 20, 2019

Katonah Museum of Art:

Extreme Jewelry, closing January 27, 2019

Magazzino Italian Art, Cold Springs, NY:

Arte Povera, ongoing

Edward Hopper House, Nyack, NY:

Angela Fraleigh, closing February 17, 2019

The Brant Foundation, Greenwich, CT:

Francesco Clemente, closing April 1, 2019

Wishing you a very happy and healthy Holiday Season, Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director and owner

New York Arts Exchange, LLC

www.nyarts-exchange.com 

Judith and Hanukkah 2018: Chag haBanot, the Festival of Daughters

Chag haBanot, The Festival of Daughters, 

1  Tevet 5779/December 9, 2018

In the North African countries Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia, Jewish women celebrate Chag haBanot, the Festival of Daughters, on the night and the day of the first full moon following the beginning of Hanukkah, usually 1 Tevet.  This occasion honors  Judith's triumph over the invasion and attempted annexation of her little village Bethulia by Nebuchadnezzar's chief general Holofernes, The story can be found in the  Apocrypha, the Book of Judith.  

Carlo Francesco Nuvolone, Judith with the Head of Holofernes, c. 1650

Typical of biblical female characters, Judith wields her power through seduction and subterfuge - bait and switch.  In this case, this widow has waited for the village elders to save the citizens from death or conquest.  Holofernes has cut off the water supply in order to pressure the village into surrender.  Inpatient and angry, Judith changes into magnificent clothes (inappropriate for one who mourns), enlists her maidservant as her chaperon and together they present themselves to the sentries guarding the encampment of Holofornes' army.  With a sack of wine and cheese in hand, Judith claims to have crucial information for the general.

Jean-Antoine-Jules Le Conte de Nouy, Judith, 1875

What harm could women do among such fierce men?  The guards lead the women to Holofernes' quarters where Judith proceeds to ply this formidable foe with plenty of cheese that delivers a mighty thirst for plenty of wine.  Thoroughly drunk as he lounges in regal style for his meal, Holofornes decides to arrange himself for Judith's pleasuring, completely unaware he facilitates Judith's scheme. Ready for sex or slumber, Judith seizes this opportunity to grab Holofernes' sword, chop off the general's head, quickly stash the severed part in her sack, and depart with her maidservant.  The assassination defeats Nebuchadnezzar's forces. From then on, Bethulia knew only peace and prosperity thanks to Judith's heroic deed.

Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith Beheading Holofernes, 1620

Here are a few customs for Chag haBanot:

• Women gather at the synagogue, touch the Torah, and pray for the health of their daughters.
• Women plan and participate in a feast on the eve of 1 Tevet.
• Cheese dishes are featured for the festive meal.
• Mothers give gifts to their daughters.
• Bridegrooms give gifts to their brides.
• Disagreements among women are reconciled.
• Women of all ages dance together.
• Women give their inheritances to the next generation.

Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith and her Maidservant, 1612-13

In Christian art, Judith personifies the Church in terms of Fortitude, Justice, Humility, and Chastity. During the Counter-Reformation, Judith's selfless action became a source of inspiration to stay faithful to the Church, 

Alessandro Botticelli, Judith and Her Maidservant, 1472

Caravaggio, Judith Slaying Holofernes, 1598-99

Cristofano Allori, Judith and the Head of Holofernes, 1613

Valentin de Boulogne, Judith Slaying Holofernes, 1626

Donatello, Judith and Holofernes, 1460

As a symbol on the Hanukkah menorah (Hanukkiyah), she parallels the courage of the Maccabees to fight against tyranny and for religious freedom.  I believe that the choice of Judith for Western European hanukkiyot seems less threatening than the figure of Judah Maccabee, whose story reminds the Jewish people of rage and rebellion. Judith in Christian and Jewish contexts signifies goodness triumphing over evil.

Italian, Anonymous, Judith on a Hanukah Menorah (Hanukkiyah), late 16th-17th century

German, Johann Adam Boller, Judith on Hannukiyan c. 1705-32, 

Jewish Museum, NY, gift of Frida Schiff Warburg

German, Johannes Valentin Schüler, Judith Hanukkiyah, Jewish Museum, Frankfurt

Happy Hanukkah to all with best wishes for Chag haBanot - tonight: the last candle

Chag Urim Sameach (Best wishes for the Festival of Lights) -

Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director 

New York Arts Exchange

www.nyarts-exchange.com

Getty Classical Statue Update: Italy Wins, Athlete of Fano Must Be Returned

  

Lysippos, Victorious Youth or Athleta di Fano, c. 300-100 BC

Getty Museum

Back in the news - Italy won its case against the Getty Museum:The Athlete of Fano/Victorious Youth  will go back home.  Here is the scoop on ArtDaily.com

Back in 2011 I covered the story in Fano, part of Le Marche in Italy, for About.com.  

Unknown                                                   The sculpture before it was cleaned
Greek, 300 - 100 B.C.
Bronze
59 5/8 x 27 9/16 x 11 in.
77.AB.30

In 1964, on a typical summer day of commercial fishing halfway between the coast of Fano, the ancient Roman city Fanum Fortunae (Temple of Fortune) in Italy, and the Croatian coast of the former Yugoslavia, the Ferrucio Ferri, a 60-foot Italian trawler, inexplicably hauled abroad a heavy human form in its fishing net. At first, the six-men crew thought they brought up a dead body. Then they scraped away some of the barnacles and realized this fishy figure was made of bronze.  Rather than report the mysterious treasure to the local authorities, Captain Romeo Pirani decided to keep this unexpected “catch” hush-hush and share with his crew the cash made from a secret sale of the object. To complete their plan, they waited until the wee hours of the next morning to sail back to port. Then, undercover of darkness, they spirited away a statue so densely covered with the crustaceans, they believed it had to be a very old work of art.

The captain took charge of the smelly bronze figure and stored it in his cousin’s garden. However, the stench from rotting fish became too powerful to bear. A few days later the statue was buried on a farm outside Fano, in a cabbage field. One month later, Giacomo Barbetti, a wealthy antiquarian from Gubbio (50 miles from Fano), looked at the bronze and identified it as a Lysippis. He offered the captain 3.5 million lira (about $4000 at the time).  Captain Pirani took about $1,200 (twice his monthly salary) as his cut for the sale.

Now Barbetti knowingly entered into an art crime by not reporting his possession of a cultural object found off the coast of Italy. (According to an Italian law set down in 1939, a work of art found on Italian territory must remain in Italy.)  

Nevertheless, this son of a concrete magnate kept the statue under wraps (literally) in red velvet, thanks to the help of Father Giovanni Nagni and his conveniently located sacristy, where the bronze was hidden. But the bronze, still encrusted with crustaceans, stank! So Father Nagni took it upon himself to drag the bronze to his home for a long salt-water soak in his bathtub. Meanwhile a passing parade of “guests” secretly visited the statue in Father Nagni’s house in Gubbio. One such “visitor,” a restorer, tipped off the local police, who staged a raid a few days later. By then Barbetti had caught wind of the informant’s deed and presto! the bronze magically disappeared.  How and in what form remains unknown. One theory is that Barbetti submerged the statue in cement and shipped it off to a monastery in Brazil. In 1966, the police convicted Barbetti and Father Nagni of criminal activity, placed them in jail and then two years later let them go, citing insufficient evidence to substantiate the charge.

By 1971, the bronze athlete had resurfaced in London and was sold to Artemis, an art consortium based in Luxembourg, for $700,000. Heinz Herzer, a German antiquarian, collected the statue and brought it to his studio for a thorough cleaning. Finally, the full beauty of the bronze figure was revealed, including the reddish rusting from the prolonged barnacle attachments. The bronze was treated to a chemical bath to arrest the further damage and then tested with Carbon-14 for dating. The results confirmed that work was executed sometime between 300-100 BC.  (Still vulnerable to rusting, the statue must be protected from high humility.)

The plot thickens . . .

Meanwhile, Dietrich von Bothmer, curator of antiquities at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose expertise was Greek vases, heard about the statue and informed his boss, Thomas Hoving, the director of the museum at this time. Hoving, who craved big-game art trophies, first licked his chops and then skittered out of the way – reluctant to enter into another questionable acquisition on behalf of the Met.  It was 1972 and Hoving had just purchased the infamous Euphronios vase for an unprecedented $1 million. The press was already breathing down his neck looking for dirt.

Four years later, on June 6, 1976, J. Paul Getty died, leaving $700 million to the GettyMuseum. Giddy with such largess and free of Getty’s stingy micromanaging scrutiny, the head curator, Burton Fredericksen immediately set his sites on the alleged Lysippis bronze that was still on the market. Fredericksen dreamed of transforming this underrated West Coast collection into top-drawer institution. An important late Hellenic bronze could make any lesser-known museum a star.

By November 1977, the newly-christened Getty Bronze entered the Getty collection, followed by a whole bunch of second-rate antiquities that curator Jiri Frel procured through “donations.” The story about Frel’s self-serving scheme of inflated appraisals that could be used for hefty tax deductions fills several pages in Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino’s sizzler Chasing Aphrodite: The Hunt for Looted Antiquities at the World’s Richest Museum, published in May 2011. The Victorious Youth makes a cameo appearance in the first chapter and again towards the end of this thriller when the Getty has to negotiate the return of numerous fenced objects. (My review  for Venice Magazine, July - August 2011, will be the next post.)

Twenty years . . . .

In 1997, Giacomo Medici, a well-known antiquities middleman associated with prominent collectors, was arrested by the Italian government for amassing an enormous amount of looted art in a Geneva warehouse.  Like Neal Caffrey, the suave and sophisticated art theft in the television series White Collar, Medici cut an elegant cosmopolitan figure. In 2004 he was found guilty by a Roman court and sentenced to a prison term of 10 years, which he is still serving.  He was also fined 10 million euros.

In May 2005, Marion True, curator of antiquities at the Getty Museum, found herself in a Roman courtroom answering to charges of receiving stolen goods and conspiring to export unlawful antiquities.  She stood trial with Robert E. Hecht, a shady supplier for the antiquities dealer Bruce McNall, who ran Summa Gallery on Rodeo Drive – the source for many Getty donors’ gifts (arranged by Jiri Frel).  The race for restitution was on – a highly competitive and diplomatically delicate sport.

By early 2006, Philippe de Montebello, then director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, visited Rome to negotiate a repatriation deal with the Italian authorities. The mutually-agreed on forfeiture sent 20 of the Met’s questionable acquisitions back to Italy, including Hoving’s celebrated “hotpot,” the Euphronios vase.  During this same period, the Getty’s newly-appointed director Michael Brand, followed suit but hit a snag.  Brand offered to return 26 items, plus the Morgantina sculpture of a goddess known as “Aphrodite.”  However, the Italian negotiators didn’t bite. They wanted the Victorious Youth, pronto.  Brand refused and walked away from the table to regroup, rethink and re-strategized the Getty position. By April 2007, an agreement was struck that required the return of 46 items from the Getty, plus the Morgantina “Aphrodite” -  but no Getty Bronze.

On February 13, 2010, the Italian courts ruled that the Victorious Youth must be repatriated to its shores. The Getty appealed the judgment. On May 3, 2012 the Italian court ruled once again that the statue must be returned to Italy, specifically Le Marche, probably Fano - although that part is not clear.

By October 2010, Marion True’s case drew to a close, dismissed from the Italian courts due to the expiration of the statue of limitations. Less than six months later, in March 2011, the Getty sent 46 antiquities to Italy, including the so-called “Aphrodite” sculpture which now belongs to Aidone, Sicily. (For the Italian government, the return of the antiquities seemed equal to an admission of guilt for collecting illicit antiquities.)

In March 2011, President Gian Mario Spacca of the Marche Region in Italy visited Los Angeles to offer a deal to “share” the Victorious Youth through extended loans.  "We are not here to declare war on the Getty," Spacca said in a statement to The LA Times. "We are here to resolve the dispute in a way that will benefit the museum, the people of Italy, and most important, art lovers around the world."

Italy is still waiting for the Getty's response.

*The Victorious Youth is known in Greek as an autostephanoumenos, a generic athlete acknowledging victory by pointing to a laurel wreath, which has, alas, disappeared.

Sources:

Felch, Jason and Ralph Frammolino, Chasing Aphrodite: The Hunt for Looted Antiquities at the World’s Richest Museum.  Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011.

www.chasingaphrodite.com

 http://ancientworlds.net/aw/Post/567373

Mattusch, Carol C. The Victorious Youth.   Los Angeles:  The J. Paul Getty Museum, 1997.  

Catherine M. Keeling’s Review of Carol C. Mattusch’s The Victorious Youth,Malibu: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 1997.http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/1998/1998-07-05.html

 Then I updated the story on October 11, 2014:

And in the US., we have our looting meshugas in the form of Getty Museum's  Victorious Youth  or Athlete from Fano.  It's legitimate ownership is still in dispute.  That long yarn of ego and intrigue was featured in Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino's book Chasing Aphrodite and in a review of the book on my other blog Beth New York.

Do you think the new Clooney Power Couple can right a wrong that is already two centuries old? If this activist Monuments Man and his spouse can't do it, then who can?

Amal Alamuddin Clooney will meet with the Greek Ministers this week.

Updated October 16th - Negotiations in progress.

Posted on my old blog Beth New York June 11, 2012:

Review of Chasing Aphrodite: The Getty Mess Sparks a Summer Sizzler

And the original publication in Venice Magazine, July-August 2011:

Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino, Chasing Aphrodite: The Hunt for Looted Antiquities at the World’s Richest Museum

(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, May 2011)

How would Gustave Flaubert update his Madame Bovary in 2011?  Perhaps, he would recast her as an ambitious art history student, eager to please and aching to get away from a boring working-class life just outside of Boston (Newburyport, to be precise).  Let’s say this updated Emma Bovary completes her degree at NYU and continues on to Harvard for a Ph.D. program but drops out when she meets an older, well-off cardiologist, looking for a trophy wife.

Now this contemporary Emma Bovary first seeks upward mobility through her marriage, just like her nineteenth-century counterpart, and spends far in excess of what her husband’s prenup lifestyle considered reasonable  – just like Flaubert’s Emma who hitched her wagon to a lowly country physician.  Dissatisfied and frustrated, our contemporary Madame Bovary takes $50,000 out of the join bank account to put a down-payment on her own condominium.  No suicide for this desperate housewife.  She got herself a Honda CVCC (surprisingly, not a Porsche) and rode out of the marriage into a heterosexually gay-divorcée sunlight.

Then what?
She found a job in commercial gallery, an unsavory choice for a Harvard ABD (all but dissertation).  That situation proved to be a Ponzi scheme of sorts, so she moved on to the ivory-tower ethos of museums, setting her cap for a numero uno spot in the food-chain of non-academic art historians: head curator (directors, these days, are just glorified fund-raisers). Finally at the top of a major museum, she became a player in the questionable practices that collecting antiquities have to offer. 

Oh, Madame Bovary in late-capitalist America, what a mess you made because of your blind ambition. (Got yourself a nice little “cottage” in the Greek isles, though, just to feel part of the authentically wealthy society you always coveted.  Well, on a curator’s salary that’s a bit of stretch beyond financial reality, don’t you think?)

         

In the end, our Flaubertian, twenty-first century Madame Bovary finally faces charges in a Roman court for trafficking in illicit antiquities, “voluntarily” resigns in disgrace (not because of acquiring hot properties, but because she accepted a loan from a museum patron that would pay off her mortgage on the Greek shack), and luckily escapes prison when the statute of limitations expires in the nick of time. The final scene describes this nouvelle Madame Bovary unemployed, but still able to renovate her kitchen somewhere in France.

However outlandish this story might sound, it’s all True (Marion True) in this summer’s sizzling exposé, Chasing Aphrodite: The Hunt for Looted Antiquities at the World Richest Museum, written by ace journalists Jason Felch and Ralph Frammolino (both from the LA Times).  Their new book characterizes the Getty Museum’s head curator of antiquities, Marion True, as a Madame Bovary for our times: self-centered, crusty and driven.  (A Greek tragedy of non-epic proportions.)

On a superficial level, Chasing Aphrodite is just plain fun to read for those who hate duplicitous hypocrites and love to hear about their well-deserved comeuppance.  For marginalized academics, the public humiliation of a self-important art historian is absolutely delicious. What Schadenfreude glee to see the “righteous” punished for going along with an administration that implicitly obstructed investigations into shady provenances.  (Unfortunately, Dr. True went down without the ship.) 

Although Felch and Frammolino organized their museum muckraker tome around Marion True (a novelist could not have chosen a more ironic name for a lead protagonist), the real stars of the show are not the corrupt curator and her equally corrupt colleagues (Getty directors, CEOs, dealers and suppliers).  No, the stars of the show are the works of art: the Morgantina Venus from Sicily (late 5^th century BCE), the Athlete of Fano from the Marche Region (a.k.a. Victorious Youth or “Getty Bronze”, circa 500-100 BCE), and other fabulous antiquities smuggled out of  their homelands, like kidnapped children, by some amoral nogoodniks eager for quick cash. 

         

What in the world is a late Hellenic bronze statue of a victorious athlete doing in the middle of Malibu, California? Why do the British believe they can take better care of the Parthenon sculptures than their hometown Athens, Greece?  Sheer arrogance and nothing but.  The soi-disant excuse is that larger and better endowed sanctuaries can keep these precious works in tip-top condition while smaller institutes cannot.  Nonsense.  Even with Greece’s current deficit, they can still handle the demands of a few antique marbles – particularly now that they have a spanking new museum waiting impatiently to receive them. 

At the heart of Chasing Aphrodite is a cautionary tale about today’s Emma Bovarys/Marion Trues of all genders, nationalities and social connections: careerist-lust can often lead to the road of perdition.  In the case of Marion True, trafficking in looted antiquities to increase her curatorial power on the world’s stage fed into the whole nefarious operation that supports criminal activity: the impoverished tombaroli (the actual scavengers on the ground in the archaeological sites that dig up these important historical artifacts), the middlemen (your average thug who could just as easily deal in drugs or arms as stolen artifacts), and the extraordinarily wealthy dealers (whose extravagant villas and showrooms front the looters’ booty). 

If crime and punishment is not your thing, then please read the Chasing Aphrodite for its take on classical antiquities. The writers educate the reader in a manner that is far from dry-as-dust, hopefully encouraging an appetite for a few scholarly publications online.  (I recommend Catherine M. Keesling’s review of Carol C. Mattusch’s book on the Victorious Youth, published by the J. Paul Getty Museum, 1997.)  

And then, as you reach the last page, just imagine your next trip to the Getty Villa or Greek and Roman Wings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Feeling a bit complicit?  Well, say something.  According to Sotheby’s and Christie’s most recent reports, Roman antiquity sales were heating up this spring.  Did you ever stop to consider how they get this stuff? Not from the Italian government, I can assure you.  Thanks to Chasing Aphrodite, we all should know that by now and act on the knowledge.

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Sources:

Acropolis Museum

New York Times on June 2011 Antiquities Auctions:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/18/arts/18iht-MELIKIAN18.html

Chasing Aphrodite Website 

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Catherine M. Keeling’s Review of Carol C. Mattusch’s The Victorious Youth, Malibu: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 1997.

http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/1998/1998-07-05.html

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• Mazel Tov to Italy -
• Happy Hanukah to you all -
• And best wishes for the holiday season - 

Beth New York

a.k.a. Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director and owner

New York Arts Exchange, LLC

www.nyarts-exchange.com