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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Does the Getty’s new logo remind anyone else of Enron?

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

Sound familiar? www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/07/2025

By December 1976, Spink had found a solution: Martin Lerner, then a curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, would arrange for the museum to pick up the statue. After leaving the Met, Lerner worked as a consultant for Latchford, appraising newly excavated statues.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/07/2025

But the new letters from the Rockefeller family archives reveal a critical, previously unknown chapter: the Harihara's failed sale and its subsequent diversion through one of America's most powerful families.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/07/2025

A 1974 letter between executives of Spink & Son, a prominent London art dealer, details their efforts to sell the Harihara for $300,000 – approximately $1.8 million today – with a 25% cut for Spink and the remainder for the British antiquities trafficker Douglas Latchford.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

Relooted, one of the most anticipated video games of 2025, allows players to take stolen African artifacts from Western museums and return them to their home countries. AJ+ talked to one of the creators... www.instagram.com/reel/DMETOk6...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

I see your seraphim and raise you a seraphim

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

Anyone else catch the Roman dodecahedron in the background there? Easter eggs galore....

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 31/05/2025

Meanwhile, the villages of Asmat "felt as if they'd been stripped of something" when Hoffman visited for his 2014 article on Michael Rockefeller's disappearance:

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 31/05/2025

Rockefeller, collecting sacred objects on his Asmat expeditions: “This was one kind of object that seemed to me inviolate for the encroachment of western commercialism upon Asmat art.” They’re now on display at the Met

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 07/05/2025

Art Institute of Chicago director James Rondeau is under investigation after getting intoxicated and removing his clothes on a flight to Munich on April 18. He is now on leave and his job in jeopardy as the museum investigates the incident. news.artnet.com/art-world/ar...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

The Papadimitriou family was also the source of a loan that the Getty's Marion True used to buy her vacation house on Paros. 🧐

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 18/03/2025

The Met Museum is engaged in a major PR campaign to shake free of its reputation as a hoarder of looted art. This week that campaign led to remarkably similar stories in America’s two leading papers touting the museum’s “proactive” efforts to address the problem. Do the facts match the hype?

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 08/03/2025

Manhattan Deputy DA Matthew Bogdanos has inspired a troll account. I recommend you don’t engage.

Fake account impersonating DDA Matthew Bogdanos

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 03/03/2025

Money Laundering with Art: Former Sarkozy aide accused of taking Gaddafi bribe and attempting to conceal it through art purchases Claude Guéant claims the €500,000 was from the sale of two paintings. Prosecutors say the works were sold by Christie’s for less than €20,000 archive.ph/r7jwB

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

WaPo: Experts are returning to Syria’s war-ravaged heritage sites, hoping to lay the groundwork for restoring them and reviving tourism, which they say could provide a much-needed boost to the country’s decimated economy after nearly 14 years of war. www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/20...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Fascinating and well researched backstory on these Getty mosaics

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Eiad Ghanem, head of the Syrian Association for the Management of Museums and Archaeological Sites, has called for the return of looted antiquities, halting all illegal excavations, and establishing an international fund to revive Syrian heritage and artifacts. sana.sy/en/?p=347053

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

Especially hunting for looted art at my local museum…

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

Good reminder of art as refuge on the cover of this week’s New Yorker

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

For those unfamiliar with Koutoulakis, he appears in the notorious "org chart" of the illicit trade seized from an Italian antiquities trafficker:

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

Some things don't change: Christie's is offering this "hitherto unpublished" kylix made by the "Rembrandt of ancient Greece" with a provenance linking it to a known antiquities trafficker, Nicolas Koutoulakis. www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-6...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 11/01/2025

Getty Center in Brentwood, circled in blue below, now under mandatory evacuation as Palisades fire pushes north and east toward 405 Freeway

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

For perspective, The Getty Center is east of the current fire zone, while Getty Villa is dead center of Pacific Palisades fire zone. Both have some of the best fire protection in the region, but this fire is unreal…

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

Another view: that’s the Getty Villa in the middle

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

Latest fire map shows Getty Villa is surrounded by burn but appears intact for the moment. A very serious situation…dozens of nearby homes are gone.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 17/12/2024

Objects from the hoard were distributed across the art market and falsely associated with Prakhon Chai, the research found. The institutions that currently possess objects from the hoard include Met, Art Institute, Asia Society, Brooklyn Museum, Denver Art Museum, Norton Simon, Cleveland Museum etc

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 27/11/2024

Purchased from known antiquities trafficker Frieda Tchakos long after it was cool to do so. Sorry to yuck your yum, but important context for this beauty.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

Sweet! Visited the scene of the crime this summer:

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 14/11/2024

A world-class collection of Chinese ceramics worth a whopping $1.27 billion has been donated to the British Museum by the Sir Percival David Foundation. Together, the 1,700 rare treasures constitute the most valuable gift to a museum in U.K. history news.artnet.com/art-world/br...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

cc: @Brent_Huffman @SavingMesAynak @BRRubin @HeritageAtState @ATHARProject @MuseumofLoot Look forward to sharing related research on these Afghan networks from @morecodices when it is published

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

Kapoor created a false provenance, claiming they had been acquired in 1960s by the parents of Selina Mohammed, his girlfriend at the time. He also got @artlossregister to issue a certificate. Kapoor offered them for sale as Kashi Gari tiles, asking USD$55,000 to USD$125,000.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

The following year, Kapoor returned to Pakistan and purchased six calligraphic Qur'anic wall tiles from the Butts for USD$20,000. They too were shipped from Dubai business and restored by Salmon.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

In 2006, Kapoor offered the Monumental Buddha for $4.5 million, describing it as "the largest, most important, and most astonishing Kushan Period sculpture from the ancient region of Gandhara." The sculpture was seized by U.S. law enforcement in 2012.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

“The Butts established a strategic network of contacts in the USA, Europe, China, Japan, Russia, the United Arab Emirates, Australia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and India,” prosecutors alleged. Their specialty was ancient Gandharan art from Afghanistan.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 25/10/2024

I began with an overview of antiquities trafficking networks and how they operate. www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBUh4HN4ZAo… We then looked at several familiar examples: The Getty Network, the Robert Olson Network and the Douglas...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 29/09/2024

I’m in DC this week for meetings and looking forward to this afternoon’s event at Museum of the Bible, where I’ll learn more about their acquisition of an early Hebrew manuscript that passed thru Afghan trafficking networks.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 27/09/2024

Reminded of my trek to Mount Kulen, where I saw the 1000 linga carved into the riverbed of Kbap Spean river with @poetryinstone and @maliapolitzer The Khmer Kingdom’s spiritual source

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 02/09/2024

Had no idea that Chatwin, later a celebrated travel writer, once ran the antiquities department at Sotheby’s

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 02/09/2024

He spent 6 years piecing together a cardboard box full of shards of an archaic black-figure Greek pot he bought for nothing. What emerged was the Sophilos vase now at the British Museum

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 04/07/2024

Excited to be in Istanbul for the first time for the next few days. Send all your insider tips and reach out via dm if you’re up for a drink.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 29/06/2024

We feature the Bhairava Mask returned by the Rubin Museum mentioned here at @MuseuofLoot mola.omeka.net/items/show/2071

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 23/06/2024

The church is filled with symbols of its patron, the Military Order of Saint James (aka Saint Iago, or Santiago), established in 1171 to protect us pilgrims as we walk this ancient trail. The scallop shells surrounding the sword are still worn today to ensure safe passage.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 23/06/2024

The original oak doors are still in place. Inside, the altar is strewn with bat guano and a curious Virgin Mary with a precocious standing Jesus is being eaten by termites.

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 20/06/2024

Interesting look at various building phases over centuries...

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Chasing Aphrodite @chasingaphrodite.bsky.social · 20/06/2024

Walking the Camino de Santiago for two weeks and finding lots of great history along the way. Here is the iron age site of Castromaior, a hilltop site with sweeping views of the Rio Miño valley in Lugo, occupied since VI century Bce

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