Journal of Art Crime

JOURNAL OF ART CRIME (posted from a forwarded email)

The Journal of Art Crime, published by ARCA, is the first peer-reviewed interdisciplinary academic journal in the study of art crime. This twice-yearly publication will provide vital information for members of the art trade, museums, security professionals, police, art lawyers, cultural ministries, private collectors, gallery owners and dealers, conservators, insurers, cultural heritage NGOs, as well as academics in the fields of criminology, law, art history, history, sociology, policing, security, and archaeology.

Our editorial board includes the following prominent professionals:

• Lord Colin Renfrew, Professor of Archaeology, University of Cambridge
• Petrus van Duyne, Professor of Criminology, University of Tilburg, Netherlands
• Matjaz Jager, Director, Institute of Criminology, Slovenia
• Bojan Dobovsek, Professor of Criminology, University of Maribor, Slovenia
• Travis McDade, Professor of Library Studies, University of Illinois Law School, US
• Ken Polk, Professor of Criminology, University of Melbourne, Australia
• David Simon, Professor of Art History, Colby College, US
• Erik Nemeth, The Getty Research Institute, US
• Todd Fell, Yale University Libraries, US
• Liisa van Vliet, Accenture Consulting, UK
• Dick Drent, Director of Security, the Van Gogh Museum, Netherlands
• Michael Kirchner, CPP, CIPM, Director of Safety and Security, Harvard Art Museums
• Anthony Amore, Director of Security, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, US
• Dennis Ahern, Director of Security, the Tate Museums, UK
• Richard Ellis, former Director of Scotland Yard's Arts and Antiquities Unit, UK
• Col. Giovanni Pastore, Vice-Commandante of the Carabinieri Art Protection Unit, Italy
• Neil Brodie, Professor of Archaeology, Stamford University, US
• David Gill, Professor of Archaeology, University of Swansea, Wales
• Edgar Tijhuis, Attorney, Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Benoit van Asbroeck, Attorney, Brussels, Belgium
• Howard Spiegler, Attorney, US
• Judah Best, Attorney and Smithsonian Commissioner, US

Content

Each issue of The Journal of Art Crime will include the following:

-At least five peer-reviewed academic essays

-Regular columns from expert contributors:

• Letter from the Editor, by ARCA Director Noah Charney
• Art Law & Policy, by Donn Zaretsky
• Antiquities & Archaeology, by David Gill
• Fine Art Crime, by Derek Fincham
• Security & Policing Update, by Stevan Layne
• Lessons from the History of Art Crime, by Noah Charney

-Summaries of major news and events related to art crime and cultural propertyover the six months leading up to each issue, including expert commentary

-Statistics and data on art crime, with commentary

-Informed editorials on contemporary issues

-Profiles of professionals working against art crime

-Book reviews

-Conference & Publication Listings

-Calls for Papers

-Most Wanted Artworks, with descriptions, information, and images

-Complete Literature Review & Bibliography, with commentary, in the subjects of:

• War Looting
• Art Theft
• Vandalism/Iconoclasm
• Antiquities
• Forgery/Deception
• Security/Policing

Between the academic and practical information provided, The Journal of Art Crime will be the best one-stop source for up-to-date information on all aspects of art crime.

Submissions

Submissions are welcome at any time. We publish articles from both academics and professionals, related to art crime, its history, and its repercussions. Relevant fields include criminology, law, art history, history, sociology, policing, security, archaeology, and conservation.

Academic essays should be 4000-9000 words in length (including footnotes, excluding bibliography). Please adhere to MLA style guidelines. Relevant images should be sent in jpg form in a separate email. Authors are responsible for securing any necessary permissions for the reproduction of images related to their articles. Essays considered to be of merit by peers may be returned to their authors along with rewrite guidelines which must be applied before publication. Average turnover for peer-reviewed essays is eight weeks, and two weeks for editorial or review material.

Each academic essay should be accompanied by a cover page that includes:

-author's name, affiliation, and contact information

-biographical information (up to 100 words)

-an abstract (100-200 words in length)

-six keywords that characterize the content of the article.

Please remove all identifying material from the body of the article.

Editorial proposals or submissions (book reviews, letters, etc) should include:

-brief abstract of proposed or submitted topic (200 word maximum)

-author's name, affiliation, and contact information

-biographical information (up to 100 words)

The Journal of Art Crime will also include book and exhibition reviews, conference write-ups, summaries of major recent art crimes, art-related legislation, and other relevant news, and editorial columns. The Journal welcomes submissions or proposals for any of the aforementioned.

Please send all submissions to editor@artcrime.info as an attachment in Word format.

SubscriptionsThe Journal of Art Crime will be published both as an e-journal and in printed form. Subscribers may choose the electronic form alone, or purchase the electronic and print form as a package, priced for individuals and institutions. All income from subscriptions will go directly to fund ARCA's non-profit activities.

The first issue will be published in the Spring of 2009, the second issue the following Fall. Please visit www.artcrime.info to subscribe.Please direct any queries to editor@artcrime.info.

a few upcoming event opportunities

a few notes sent to tme from Del that might be of interest -

Don Soeffing will be lecturing at--

• The Silver Society of Canada on Oct. 22nd
• Heritage Auction Galleries in Dallas on Nov. 1st.
• the Decorative Arts League in San Francisco on 11 August 2009
  

Roderick Thompson has offered to host a tour of his restoration workshop Santo Spirito in Brooklyn for those who live in the NY Metropolitan area--

• Let him know when and whom, and he can make arrangements.
• His shop is in the Gowanus Canal area, but is easily accessible by F train.
• A mapquest search to locate 112 2nd Avenue is recommended.
• A date and time can be decided upon with short advance, so that all involved could make the plan.
• Rod also suggests lunch at a congenial Modanese trattoria/pizzeria closeby.
  

Anyone interested is welcome to contact me (Del -[Alyssum Enterprises [alyssum.usa@worldnet.att.net]), and we can coordinate our schedules with Roderick.

Vik Muniz: verso

This is an exhibition by a well known contemporary artist, Vik Muniz. The content of the exhibition - the back of paintings and what they reveal about authenticity, provenance, etc- might be of interest here.

Vik Muniz, Verso
Sikkema Jenkins & Co.Chelsea
530 West 22nd Street, 212-929-2262September 6 - October 11, 2008 Opening: Saturday, September 6, 6 - 8PM

Whenever someone wants to see if an artwork is ‘real’, the first gesture is to look at its back or at it’s base; the part of it that normally isn’t visible to anyone but experts, dealers, museum conservators or the artists themselves. This happens because while the image’s objective is to remain eternally the same, its support is constantly changing, telling its story, showing its scars, its labels and periodic clichés. So when a cousin of mine told me his 7-year old could paint a Picasso, I told him ‘probably, but he couldn’t do the back’. As a teenager, I used to fix the neighbor’s TV as a hobby. I wanted to learn how to fix clocks too. Whenever something‘s function is basically visual, there is always an opening in the back for curiosity to do its damage.
-Vik Muniz in an unpublished interview, 2005
For over 20 years Muniz has consistently defined art as a subtle connection between mind and matter by recreating iconic images while simultaneously revealing and debasing the process of their making. Muniz aims to distill the binding agent connecting concept and substance in art via an exercise of meta-objectivity that reveals the “particle and wave” nature of cultural artifacts in general. While keeping within the conceptual frameworks of Muniz’s previously established images Verso marks a return to the object-making that first brought him attention in the late 1980s.
People who have seen images one million times in books go to the museum to have a chance to read their labels. They would be much happier if the painting was turned backwards so instead of having to associate name to image they would have to imagine the picture while reading the label.
-Muniz, ibid.
Verso consists of a group of 3-dimensional trompe-l’oeils of the actual backs of such iconic works as Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, Van Gogh’s Starry Night and Seurat’s La Grande Jatte that, over a period of six years, Muniz photographed and systematically studied in partnership with the curatorial and conservation departments of MOMA, the Guggenheim and the Art Institute of Chicago, as well as with a team of dedicated craftsman, artists, forgers, and technicians. These are disconcertingly faithful reproductions in a 1:1 scale realized in an inch-by-inch process that did not spare the slightest detail. Every scratch, dent or scribble is physically reproduced to photographic precision. Authentic looking labels, worn-away tape, faded pencil notations and actual period hardware and carpentry make it hard even for an expert to disbelieve they are seeing the actual backs of these masterpieces.
There is a great tradition of trompe-l‘oeil representations depicting the verso of paintings that hark back to Cornelius Gijsbrechts in the mid-1600s. They can be seen throughout the Baroque period until 19th century with artists such as Harnett and Peto and in the 1960s and 70s in the works of some photo realists but the act of feigning to illustrate painting’s material nature through skillful illusion dates back to the 5th century BC with Parrhasius, the conceptual artist, who fooled Zeuxis by perfectly painting fabric over a “painting.” These are pictures of paintings as commodities and I somehow find something eternally contemporary about them. Drawing attention away from their primary function, as well as from their actual support, these paintings always appear as a responsive redefinition of the medium through the exercise of its own limitations. By continuously updating Parrhasius’ picture-object paradigm the artist is able to embrace the cause of realism with all its foolishness and flamboyance.
-Muniz, ibid
Along with Verso, Muniz will be exhibiting equally confounding recreations of the backs of famous photographs from the New York Times archive at MOMA. The backs are full of cancelled dates, yellowed newspaper captions and rubber cement stains offering a glimpse of the life of these images in the newsroom and beyond.
Vik Muniz will be curating an artist’s choice exhibition at MOMA this December. His retrospective, organized by the Miami Art Museum in 2006, is currently on view in Mexico City at the Antiguo Colegio de San Ildefonso. His work is in the collection of many museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Guggenheim, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Centre George Pompidou, the Centro Cultural Reina Sofia, and the Irish Museum of Modern Art.Muniz was born in Brazil and currently lives and works in Brazil and Brooklyn.

USPAP Certification

It appears that the USPAP results and certifications have been mailed. I recieved mine. If you haven't, you should call one of the powers that be and find out where it is.

Make up test for American Silver

Hi All:
A couple of people are having to take make up tests for Don's American Silver class. They are going to have to do it over the phone. They are wondering if anyone has any notes. if so post them here or email Laura at lattanzi.laura@gmail.com

Wasn't there two people at least who needed to take the test this way?

regardless of notes, I think if you read the papers that he handed out, you might be able to come up with some hints.

ok, anyone with notes, step up!!!!

Did I Miss Anything????

Hi all,
I have finished adding a post to the blog on each of the assignments that were due outside of the class. I have to say it has been very beneficial to me personally to put this together. It has been a way for me to go back and absorb some of the information that I was not able to absorb in the whirlwind four weeks. After the class I was thrown back into real life work as many of you were too, I’m sure.

So please contact me if I have forgotten something or if you would like for me to add another post about anything else.

Best,
JD Talasek
Director
Cultural Programs of the National Academy of Sciences (CPNAS)
500 5th Street, NW Room NAS271
Washington DC 20001 (o) 202.334.3104 (f) 202.334.1690 jtalasek@nas.edu www.nasonline.org/arts

Assignment: Sylvia Leonard Wolf: Fine Art

Instructor: Sylvia Wolf
Course: Fine Art
email sylvialwolf@gmail.com

Like Jane's assignments, these are past due at the time of this post. There were two assignments on painters Durand or Kensett. The first was due on July 16 and the second was due on July 21.

If you missed this, email me (jtalasek@nas.edu) and I'll give you more information. However, I strongly suggest that you contact Sylvia at this point.