Silk Road Blocks

This was supposed to be a year of celebration in the rarefied world of antiquities: Having finally settled Italy’s claims over apparently looted objects in their collections, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York, the J. Paul Getty Museum, in Los Angeles, and other institutions could finally get back to business. Archaeologists were mollified, and dealers, although grumbling a bit, noted that the market was cleaner now than ever before.

But it was not to be. In late January, federal agents raided four Southern California museums, several antiquities dealers and the holdings of a Chicago-area private collector as part of a five-year investigation into the sale of antiquities looted from Thailand, China, Cambodia, Myanmar and the U.S. Southwest. In affidavits attached to the search warrants, the government alleges an elaborate scheme in which plundered antiquities—mainly ancient Ban Chiang artifacts from Thailand—were illegally imported into the U.S., sometimes labeled as replicas, and sold to a collector, who was in reality an undercover agent. The dealers who sold the works to the agent also purportedly provided appraisals valuing some objects at several times their purchase prices and arranged for the pieces to be donated to local museums so that the buyer could claim a deduction on his taxes. Surprisingly, much of the conduct described in the affidavit allegedly took place in 2006 and 2007, just as Italy’s pursuit of items in American museums was making headlines.

The investigation—which at press time had not led to any indictments—centers largely on the Silk Roads Gallery, in Los Angeles, owned by Jon and Cari Markell, whose Web site advertises “rare Asian spiritual and decorative masterpieces” and “an exquisite selection of antique and contemporary furniture, accessories, paintings and gifts” from Asia. Another focus is antiquities dealer Robert Olson, of Cerritos, California, together with several other area dealers. The museums that allegedly accepted donations of tainted artifacts include the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA); the Bowers Museum, in Santa Ana; the Mingei International Museum, in San Diego; and the Pacific Asia Museum, in Pasadena. According to newspaper reports, the collection of Chicago philanthropist Barry MacLean, who is said to have bought a number of pieces from Olson over the years, was also searched. In a brief telephone interview, Olson declined to comment on the matter, and MacLean did not respond to a telephone message left at his office.

Contacted by e-mail, Jon Markell referred all questions to his attorney, John Vandevelde, who said in a statement that his clients were “cooperating with the authorities” and “trying to understand how items that are imported by others, clear U.S. Customs and are purchased by the Markells in the United States could possibly be illegal.” LACMA, the Mingei and the Pacific Asia Museum issued statements saying they were cooperating with the investigation; the first two additionally suggested that they would consider returning items that federal officials can prove were looted.

Like Mediterranean antiquities, those from Asia are subject to laws governing who can excavate, own and export artifacts. Nevertheless, archaeologists claim that the markets for both categories rely on illegal digs for at least some of their wares. In Thailand, the removal of ceramics and bronzes of the Ban Chiang culture, which flourished between circa 2100 B.C. and A.D. 200, may not be as conspicuous as the theft of Khmer reliefs from Cambodia, which have in the past been hacked from temple façades by chainsaw-wielding gangs. But the Thai plundering is even more damaging to the archaeological record, says Robert E. Murowchick, director of the International Center for East Asian Archaeology at Boston University: “Most Ban Chiang graves and other sites are looted before they have been examined by archaeologists. And after they have been looted, we have no way of knowing what they originally contained.” According to the affidavits in the present case, the Cambodian and the Thai trades are equally illegal: Although artifacts typical of the Ban Chiang culture have been surfacing since the late 1950s, the site of Ban Chiang itself was not discovered until 1966, five years after Thailand enacted a law asserting national ownership of all archaeological resources. Nonetheless, Ban Chiang wares are in the collections of many major U.S. museums, and both real and forged artifacts are sold widely in Bangkok. “You can go to any number of shops in Bangkok that openly trade in this material and buy 100 Ban Chiang pots before lunch,” says the New York dealer James Lally, who specializes in traditional Asian art and objects. “There is no enforcement; it’s all out on tables.”