Arts, anitiquities and the Nelson

There's a good to great article in The New York Times yesterday about, as said above, arts and antiquities at some American museums nationwide, from the Met in New York to the Getty in Los Angeles:

The Great Giveback

THE news has become astonishingly routine: a major American museum announces it is relinquishing extraordinary antiquities because a foreign government claims they were looted and has threatened legal action or other sanctions if it doesn’t get them back.

For once, I disagree with The New York Times. I doubt this will happen frequently.

In an article about antiquities going back to the individuals piece's origin, The Times is defending the US and our American arts institutions in this lengthy writing about why we should be able to keep them. The paper says "Needless restitution of antiquities makes ancient art less available for the public."

Various arts pieces were looted from these locations in the past, only to sit in these institutions today. 

And naturally, the Times--and the US--would be all behind keeping these pieces here. The article says "Baseless lawsuits by foreign governments are intimidating American museums."

And isn't that just too bad?

First, "baseless"?  What's baseless?  If these lawsuits were truly baseless, they wouldn't achieve the return of any items.

Second, their other quote about making these pieces "less available for the public"?  Yeah, right.  For what public, though?  For the American public?  That one?  Or are they suggesting it would be seen by far more people in New Yawk City?  I don't know the answer to that but it seems at least fair to the people of the country of origin would and should be able to have and see and show their own people's art and antiquities.

It will be interesting to see if Chinese arts institutions, backed by the Chinese govenrment, of course, will ever go after the The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art  since the Nelson got a lot of their pieces during the 30's when the museum was first created.

Stay tuned.  We'll see, of course.