[MSN] Recovered art spotlighted in Rome

[Museum Security Network Mailinglist]

Recovered art spotlighted in Rome

 Guercino, Luca Giordano and unseen Modigliani  (ANSA) - Rome, October 31 - Stolen treasures recovered by Italy's crack art cops are the stars of a new show in Rome .

Stolen Art: The Return features about 100 works including Roman and Etruscan artefacts and masterpieces by Tiepolo, Guercino and Luca Giordano .

One of the works, Amedeo Modigliani's 'Fillette aux bas rouges' (Girl with the Red Stockings), was stolen from a private Rome collection in the 1990s and has never been shown before .

Another, a huge Etruscan statue of the Greek hunting goddess Artemis portrayed as an Amazon, was recovered last year in one of the major coups of recent loot-hunting efforts .

There are two Guercinos on show, a St John and a St Margaret of Antioch .

The latter went missing from the church of St Peter in Chains - home of Michelangelo's famed Moses - in 1976 and was recovered in 1989 .

The Luca Giordanos, stolen from Rome churches in the '80s, are two of a famous series on the life of the Catholic Church father, St Augustine .

The free exhibition, which runs until December 19, is the first at the provincial government's revamped headquarters in a lavish 18th-century palazzo which has been renamed 'Palazzo Incontro' (Meeting Palace) .

"This exhibition shows just how precious the work of the Carabinieri Cultural Heritage Protection Unit and the Finance Guard is," said Rome's provincial governor, Enrico Gasbarra .

Among those at the show's opening was Carabinieri General Ugo Zottin, who warned that pillaging of ancient Italian sites by tomb raiders is no longer the number one threat to the country's artistic heritage .

"What worries us most at the moment is the constant plundering of churches and religious institutes," said the country's No.1 art cop .

"They're going after everything - even in deconsecrated churches or other places in which people no longer worship," Zottin said .

Many of Italy's churches are walk-in museums where security is minimal .

Several churches have suggested asking tourists to pay a small fee to go towards protecting their contents .

General Zottin hinted that tomb raiders and their trafficking clients may have been discouraged by recent accords with international museums on the return of plundered artefacts, which make burial sites less attractive targets .

http://ansa.it