- On holiday and want me to keep your mail?
- Latest news on the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica
- Art registry did not inform Met of claim
- Re: again: museum fire caused by construction work
- Re: again: museum fire caused by construction work
- Exhibit Safety Services
- Crime in museums & galleries
- Dutch customs find stolen atlases
- Greek students in Britain begin campaign for Parthenon Marbles' return
- list of (mirror)websites dedicated to the (return of) the Elgin Marbles
- City history society seeks to sell its art
- German Cops Seize Alleged Stolen Art
 
 
 
 
 
- Please let me know if you want me to keep your mail during your annual holiday. Inform me about the period you are absent. I will unsubscribe you temporarily and send you all mail as a digest after you return. Do not let your mailbox overflow. This will cause mail to bounce and puts a lot of pressure on ISP servers....
Ton Cremers
-----------------------------------------------------------
 
From: gilbooks@ix.netcom.com
Date sent: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 11:52:26 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Latest news on the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica
 
Your efforts and concern on behalf of the endangered Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica
(BPH) of Amsterdam are having good effect. They are contributing to recent developments
that trend toward a happy out come, although the whole matter is still unresolved.
On 23 July, 1997, the Council for Culture of the Netherlands Ministry of Education,
Science, and Culture declared that "the BPH is irreplaceable and essential to the Dutch
cultural heritage". They made this determination according to the criteria of the Cultural
Heritage Act of 1994 requiring the designation of collections "irreplaceable and
essential" to the national cultural heritage. This same designation had been made in more
preliminary forms in 1993 and 1994.
The declaration constitutes a positive advice to the State Secretary of the Ministry
recommending the placement of the BPH on the list established by the 1994 law. According
to the Council's press release, "Objects or collections placed on the list coming under the
Cultural Heritage Act may not be sold if sale entails the risk that the object or
collection disappears abroad."
The press release adds that "the State Secretary asked the Council's advice following ING
Bank's intention to transport the collections of the BPH to London for auction. ING holds
the collections of the library in pledge."
It is my understanding that such designation can still allow a sale within the Netherlands,
although the buyer still could not export the collections. Furthermore, it seems to me
that since a domestic buyer must maintain the BPH intact, this tends toward a good result,
especially if the most likely willing and able buyer is the government.
Please do not cease your efforts to show your support for the BPH. Your expressions of
support have been having a very tangible and positive effect.
I am aware of some objections to aspects of the history or formation of the BPH. These are
complex matters, and few of us are in possession of all the relevant information. In any
case, it would be illogical to refrain from protecting the BPH as it now exists as a
collection and an institution, or to refrain from advocating its protection, on the basis
of any alleged impurity in its origin or history. What matters now is not intentions but
actions, not the past but the future.
Note that the Council made this determination not only because of the BPH collection
itself, but also in light of the uses made of it. The BPH has an active program of
exhibitions, aesthetically and bibliographically superb publications, and high-level
scholarship. It is a successful and important factor in promoting academic studies in its
fields and has been cheerfully made open to all. It is a living library, staffed by
talented persons, and it can have a brilliant future contributing to our common For further
information contact
Dr. Frans Janssen, Director of the BPH
tel.: 31-20-6258079
fax.: 31-20-6200973
and/or
Gina Luiten, press officer of the Raad voor Culture (Council for Culture)
tel.: 31-70-3106686
Also, I'll be glad to discuss and to provide what information I have.
Feel free to cross-post this to any listserv.
----------------------------------------------------------------
 
 
From: W_Robinson@globe.com
To: W_Robinson@globe.com
Date sent: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 10:16:37 -0400
Subject: Art registry did not inform Met of claim
-- Forwarded by Walter V Robinson/Editorial/GLOBE on
07/25/97 10:23 AM ---
 
 
Other stories from this series and related links are available on the
Globe Online at http://www.boston.com. Use the keyword : Paintings.
Art registry did not inform Met of claim
By Walter V. Robinson, Globe Staff, 07/25/97
The Art Loss Register acknowledged yesterday that it has known for at
least a year that a Claude Monet painting at the New York Metropolitan
Museum of Art may have been stolen during World War II, but it never
informed the Met or the museum trustee who donated it.
Ronald S. Tauber, the chairman of the New York office of the
Register, an industry-created agency that catalogs art thefts, said it
was the responsibility of theft victims - and not the Register - to make
their claims known.
The Met is a client of the Art Loss Register.
Over the past three days, officials at the Register's offices in New
York and London have offered conflicting accounts of their knowledge of
the alleged theft, and of what steps they took after they learned of it
in December 1995. When The Boston Globe asked an official at the
Register's New York office about the Monet on Tuesday, she denied that
the painting had been reported stolen or missing.
The Globe reported yesterday that the Met has in its collections both
the Monet and a 15th -century Netherlands painting that the Globe
discovered in a catalog of World War II art looted by the Nazis that was
published by the Belgian government.
An unidentified German filed a claim for the Monet in March. The
Belgian government said on Wednesday that it is preparing to file its
own claim for the 15th -century painting.
The Met spokesman, Harold Holzer, said of the 1994 donation of the
Monet by longtime trustee Jayne Wrightsman that the Met ``naturally
assumes that all of the pieces presented to us are presented
honorably.'' In fact, he said yesterday, only a handful of pieces of the
millions the museum has received have proved to be stolen.
Holzer said the museum routinely checks the past ownership, or
provenance, of gifts and purchases, although he acknowledged it made no
such inquiry when it accepted the Wrightsman Monet.
Asked whether the museum has a responsibility to check volumes of
wartime art losses published by European governments to ensure that the
museum does not possess stolen works, Holzer said that it is ``not a
simple matter to be tuned into every register, every archive, every
publication, every book.''
Many art specialists, and some museum curators, have expressed
concerns that museums are often so eager to obtain valuable artworks
that they are reluctant to ask probing questions about provenance,
especially of trustees and benefactors offering to donate works the
museums would otherwise have to spend millions of dollars to obtain.
Jonathan Petropoulos, an art historian at Loyola College in Baltimore
and the author of a book on Nazi treatment of art, said he believes the
Met, above all museums, ``has a special responsibility to check art loss
volumes because, as one of the greatest museums in the world, they do
and should set an example for other institutions.'' Moreover, he said,
the Met has the resources to do extensive provenance checks.
There is mounting evidence, much of it culled by scholars from the US
National Archives, that an undetermined number of the artworks plundered
during the war, many of them taken from Jewish collectors by the Nazis,
were bought in the postwar years by American collectors. Though the 15th
-century painting is considered, at least by Belgium, as Nazi loot, its
prewar owner was not a Jew. The identity of the Monet claimant has not
been disclosed, but Holzer said he is not Jewish.
As for the Monet, Holzer said it was prominently displayed at the Met
in late 1994, shortly after Wrightsman donated it, and was listed in the
museum's acquisition catalog for 1994.
Tauber, the chairman of the Art Loss Register's New York office,
explained in an interview yesterday that the Register serves only as a
repository for reported art losses, and its registry is regularly
checked by auction houses and museums before they acquire artworks. But
he said the Register, whose principal backers are insurance companies
who insure artworks, does not have the resources to investigate claims.
Within the art world, some specialists have said they believe the
Register is too passive. Its handling of the Monet claim, even by its
own accounts, was far from aggressive.
On Tuesday, Anna Kisluk, director of the Register's New York office,
denied that the Monet was listed in the Register's database. But after
an Australian affiliate of the Register confirmed that the painting was
indeed listed in the Register database, Kisluk said on Wednesday that
she had made a mistake, and had not intended to mislead the Globe.
Tauber, in an initial interview yesterday, said the German claimant
provided the Register's London office with evidence that Wrightsman
owned the painting when he first filed the claim in December 1995 or
January 1996. After checking further, Tauber said it was June 1996
before the Register learned of the ownership. Tauber did not take over
the Register until this past May.
Wrightsman donated the work to the Met late in 1994, but Tauber said
the Register did not learn the Met owned it until this March. Kisluk,
for her part, insisted in a telephone interview yesterday that she was
unaware the Monet was at the Met until she read yesterday's report.
Tauber insisted the Register had no contact with the Met about the
painting between December 1995, when it learned of the theft, and March
1997, when the alleged theft victim filed a claim against the Met. Even
if the alleged victim had provided no evidence of the work's
whereabouts, a check by the Register of a catalog of Monet's works
could have found it.
``We are not in the business of searching every catalog. And we do
not have the resources to investigate every claim,'' Tauber said. He
also said the Register had no obligation to contact a work's listed
owner.
This story ran on page A01 of the Boston Globe on 07/25/97.
Copyright 1997 Globe Newspaper Company.
------------------------------------------------------------
 
Date sent: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 07:54:55 -0800
From: Scott Reuter <reuter@EARTHLINK.NET>
Organization: Exhibit Safety Services
Subject: Re: again: museum fire caused by construction work
 
> Museum fires--each of which was caused by construction on the roof.
> When is anybody going to get a clue about the dangers of construction in
> historic buildings?
 
Sounds to me as if the Museum Staff were lax in developing strict
guidelines to prevent such a disaster. Certainly the construction firm is
responsible for the fire, but don't forget who was responsible for the
collection (I think we all learned that in our first museology class). You
will probably see more and more of this as museums continue to turn
themselves into theme parks to draw in more visitors.
 
Best Regards,
 
Scott Reuter
-------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Date sent: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 16:13:00 GMT
From: Hodcarry <hodcarry@AOL.COM>
Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com
Subject: Re: again: museum fire caused by construction work
 
Anyone who has interested in museums and/or libraries for any length of
time can come up with a long list of damage and stolen items that
happened during construction. I know of one large art museum that had a
good security system-for example a computer kept track of who opened locks
in collection areas. But the museum did not assign folks to watch
construction workers who were removing walls. As a result they lost quite
a few objects, recovered most when a dealer alerted police when offered
some of the items for resale. I guess the point is security costs
including staff people on duty have to be built into construction costs.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Date sent: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 22:48 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: RE: your Museum-L contribution, Exhibit Safety Services
From: Scott Reuter <reuter@earthlink.net>
To: Museum Security Mailinglist <securma@xs4all.nl>
 
I would be glad to give information regarding my business to the Museum
Security Network. Basically I am a full-time freelance preparator, and
while my background is general exhibit safety for art/objects on display
and in storage, I currently spend most of my time doing earthquake damage
mitigation for private collectors in the Los Angeles area. I worked as a
preparator for the J. Paul Getty Museum for 10 plus years, and after the
Northridge earthquake in 1994 (no damage to any objects in any of the
collections I had secured) I started Exhibit Safety Services.
More information about my work, background, (and earthquake damage
mitigation) is available on my website at:
http://www.earthlink.net/~reuter
or feel free to e-mail me again if you have more specific questions. Thanks
for your interest.
Best Regards,
Scott Reuter
-------------------------------------------------------
--SECOND REQUEST-
Date sent: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 23:36:29 +0000
From: "A. Wright" <jp37@DIAL.PIPEX.COM>
Subject: Crime in museums & galleries
 
As part of an academic program, with very practical applications, I am
interested in finding out if anyone has, or knows of, research into non
"heritage crime" in museums and galleries. Whilst there is a great deal
of information about crime involving collection material there seems to
be far less about the effects, volume and trends about the way in which
heritage sites, and their staff, are victims of the more traditional
crimes that other businesses suffer.
Whilst I am primarily interested in UK experiences and figures, all
contributions are welcomed.
Replies direct by e mail please.
 
Alan Wright: jp37@dial.pipex.com
---------------------------------------------------------
Dutch customs find rare atlases
(Friday July 25, NRC and De Volkskrant)
During a routine check at Amsterdam Airport (Schiphol) six very rare 16th to 18th atlases were discovered. The atlases appeared to be stolen from the Lviv Stefanyk library of the National Academy of science in the Ukraine. The library is renowned for it's large collection of rare and old books. Two men from the Ukraine have been arrested.
Among the atlases is a rare Ortelius Atlas and an atlas printed by Plantin of Antwerp. Custom officers discovered that owner stamps had been removed in a very unprofessional way with correction fluid. This fluid has severely damaged some of the engravings. Together with experts of the Dutch Royal Library the provenance of the atlases could be traced. Most likely they were stolen between February 1995 and July this year. An anonymous expert told that many stolen books and prints are offered for sale, many of which come from Eastern Europe. At the end of 1996 a large collection rare books were stolen from a Moscow library. According to the same expert there is a lot of money in the trade in stolen books. Old books become more rare since many libraries bought a lot the past 30 to 40 years. At the same time demand for interesting material is growing. Atlases are very popular because of the fact that individual prints are sellable as well.
--------------------------------------------------------
 
Greek students in Britain begin campaign for Parthenon Marbles' return
 
Athens, 26/7/1996 (ANA)
Greek student societies in Britain will stage protests outside the British Museum, the Ministry of Heritage and British embassies around the world on November 14 to campaign for the return of the Parthenon Marbles to Greece.
In a statement by the Union of Hellenic Student Societies in the United Kingdom released yesterday, the union said that they had designated November 14 as "Parthenon Day".
The campaign will include mass mailings to British officials calling for negotiations on a timetable for the return, debates, and Parthenon Day Web Sites at the Internet addresses of: http://www.greece.org/eefkmed and http://www.uk.digiserve. com/mentor /marbles.
---------------------------------------------------------
 
(Mirror)websites dedicated to the (return of) the Elgin Marbles:
GREECE:
http://rethymno.forthnet.gr/marmara/http://rethymno.forthnet.gr/marmara/
http://www.hol.gr/mirrors/hec/marbles/http://www.hol.gr/mirrorw/hec/marbles/
http://www.damon.gr/marbles/http://www.damon.gr/marbles/
USA:
http://ares.math.utk.edu/marbles/http://ares.math.utk.edu/marbles/index.htm
http://www.greece.org/marbles/http://www.greece.org/marbles/
http://www.diaspora-net.org/marbles/http://www.diaspora-net.org/marbles/
Britain:
http://www.uk.digiserve.com/mentor/marbles/
www.uk.digiserve.com/mentor/marbles/
In Greek:
http://www.uk.digiserve.com/mentor/marmara/
http://www.uk.digiserve.com/mentor/marmara/
France (in French):
http://www.mygale.org/05/acropole/http://www.mygale.org/05/acropole/
Germany
http://www.griechenland.de/kultur/parthenon/index.htm
www.griechenland.de/kultur/parthenon/index.htm
-------------------------------------------------------------
 
The Philadelphia Inquirer
Sunday, July 27, 1997
City history society seeks to sell its art
The Historical Society of Pa. wants to narrow its role. Treasures would go, to maintain its archives.
by Stephan Salisbury
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER
 
Quietly, with no public notice, the Historical Society of Pennsylvania has asked court approval to sell, barter or give away virtually its entire collection of art and artifacts -- including some of the rarest and most valued treasures held by any institution in the country.
In a petition filed last month in Philadelphia Orphans' Court, the 173-year-old society portrayed itself as a research library, not a museum. Therefore, the society contended, it is unable to maintain and preserve objects placed in its care by generations of donors reaching as far back as the early years of the city, commonwealth and new republic.
Philadelphia's only portrait by John Singleton Copley, household effects of Thomas Jefferson, and a massive statue of actor Edwin Forrest would be disposed of immediately if the court gives its blessing, perhaps by early fall.
The bulk of the collection, comprising thousands of items -- including the wampum belt given to William Penn by the Leni-Lenape in 1682 -- would go into storage to await dispersal in three years. Proceeds from future sales would be used to care for and maintain the historical archives the society will retain.
This means, according to the state Attorney General's Office -- which enforces laws relating to nonprofits and charitable organizations -- and the society's chairman of the board, that funds from sales of paintings and other precious objects may be used to defray the cost of the society's imminent $7.5 million building expansion and renovation.
The plan to sell and disperse the whole collection -- or ``deaccession'' it, in museum parlance -- while not widely known outside the historical society, has begun to cause an outcry among historians, scholars and archivists who question both the wisdom and the ethics of the society's new course.
At least four out of about 30 or so board members have resigned in recent months, distressed over the policy.
``If the collection is deaccessioned through sales or gifts, once it's dispersed, it's dispersed, and it can never be brought together again,'' said former member of the board of councillors Carol S. Baldridge, who resigned in April.
In a letter to the board at that time, Baldridge wrote: ``I cannot condone or stand by while a collection I care passionately about is broken up or de-accessioned. And I will not compromise my own standards to follow poor leadership decisions.''
Susan Stitt, society executive director, acknowledged that the disposal would be ``unprecedented.''
``There is regret that this is an institution that never had an adequate capacity to care for everything,'' Stitt said last week. ``It still doesn't. We can't do everything.''
Stitt said the society had scrambled to find funds to continue to preserve and provide access to its archives, as well as cover its exhibition and museum costs. The $1.6 million annual operating budget, she said, is simply inadequate.
``This institution doesn't have the capacity to raise the money to become a world-class library and a world-class museum,'' she said. ``We don't have the staff, and we don't have the fund-raising capacity.''
Any money raised from sale of objects, Stitt said, would be used solely for ``acquisitions and care of the collection.''
Brent D. Glass, executive director of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission in Harrisburg, called the society's decision to remake itself ``a courageous one.'' He noted that funding for operations had been tight for years, with no prospects for improvement. Society officials, in Glass' view, ``faced up to long-deferred issues and made a decision.'' As a result, he said, the society has a real future.
But not everyone is willing to accept that decision or that future.
Randall Miller, professor of history at St. Joseph's University and former editor of the society's Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, characterized the deaccessioning as ``an evisceration.''
``The great treasures of Philadelphia could be scattered across the country, if not the world,'' Miller said. ``This is of vital concern to everyone in the city if Philadelphia is going to utilize its cultural treasures as an economic [development ] resource. These are not artifacts but literally treasures.
`` There is a fundamental redefinition of the historical society under way, and yes, there is the right of a private institution to define itself,'' he said. ``But there is also a public mission and a public responsibility. People have been giving items and entrusting items to the historical society for nearly 200 years . . . .
``The divestiture is not just a recasting of the institution but a betrayal of the public trust.''
Specifically, the petition asks Orphans' Court -- which has jurisdiction over estates and charities -- for the immediate disposal of five items:
-A renowned double portrait of Gov. Thomas and Sarah Mifflin by colonial painter John Singleton Copley -- appraised for insurance purposes in 1995 for $4 million -- that the society wants to sell to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The portrait was bequeathed to the society nearly a century ago by Esther Fisher Wistar, whose husband was a direct descendant of Copley's subjects, the first governor of Pennsylvania and his wife.
-Thomas Jefferson's clock and thermometer, plus a Rembrandt Peale portrait of Jefferson's close friend, the botanist Jose Francisco, Abbe Correa de Serra. All three items have been on loan to Monticello, Jefferson's Virginia estate, for about three years, and the society is negotiating a sale to the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, Monticello's owner and operator. For insurance purposes, the clock and thermometer were appraised in 1992 for $775,000 and $25,000, respectively, and the portrait of the Abbe was valued in 1994 at $20,000.
-A massive marble statue of actor Edwin Forrest, appraised in 1986 for $60,000. The society wants to give the statue to Freedom Theatre, which occupies Forrest's old mansion at Broad and Master Streets in North Philadelphia. The statue was transferred to the society, along with numerous other items and papers and $200,000, when the Parkside Avenue Edwin Forrest Home for aged actors was closed about 10 years ago. Freedom Theatre officials said they would love to have the piece, but said their building is structurally incapable of supporting so heavy an object.
The rest of the society's collection -- about 10,000 items, according to court papers -- would go into storage for about three years. During that time, renovations to the society's building at 13th and Locust Streets would be finished and the transformation into a research library and archive would be complete.
At this point, however, only about $2 million of the $7 million-plus needed to complete the project has been raised, according to board members.
In 2001, court papers say, the society would seek to place its collection in a ``new history center to be established in Philadelphia.'' If such a center does not exist by then -- and very few close to the matter think it is even a remote possibility -- then the society would seek to sell, trade or give the objects to ``other public institutions.''
Stitt said first priority would be placement with Philadelphia-area institutions, but the court documents do not say that. Any item that does not find a home with a public institution ``will be sold at public auction,'' the court papers say.
In addition to the Penn wampum belt, the objects include Penn's writing desk; a clock owned by David Rittenhouse; John Paul Jones' telescope; portraits by Charles Wilson Peale, Gilbert Stuart and Thomas Sully; John Wanamaker's office; and one of the finest collections of early-American furniture and pewter in the world. The list goes on and on.
The society would retain fewer than 100 items that relate to its own history.
After deaccession, society officials say, they would be able to focus fully on their new mission as a research library. Holdings would consist of 500,000 books, 300,000 graphic works and 15 million manuscript items.
Howard Lewis, board chairman since 1992, argued that the society has been incapable of being both a museum and an archive. In recent years, exhibitions have drawn only about 3,000 visitors a year, he said, and proper storage of the objects is becoming impossible.
``There is no way in our building we can discharge our museum function or our archival function adequately,'' Lewis said. ``To keep these objects here is to keep them away from the public.'' Besides, Lewis said, ``there's very little connection between the archives and the objects.''
Some scholars and archivists, however, say that is not the case. Removing the Wanamaker artifacts would sever their connection to the Wanamaker papers, they say. Dispersing the Thomas Sully paintings would sever them from his journal and written register of paintings. Dealing off some Penn objects would separate them from the Penn papers.
Connecting historical papers and documents with tangible objects, scholars maintain, is at the heart of much current thinking about the presentation of history in contemporary culture.
``They are running on a model of historical research that came of age in the 1960s,'' said Morris Vogel, professor of history at Temple University, referring to society officials. ``They can probably do it if they can sell the collection for the right amount of money. But is it right to do that, given how much has been invested in that institution by this community over the years? Given this community's current needs and the effort the city is making to build cultural tourism, is that appropriate?
``The Lions come here because of the presentation of history,'' Vogel said. ``Even if everyone doesn't understand the importance of history, they should understand that people's livelihoods depend on it. That's what HSP should be looking at.''
Several former board and staff members say the society loosened its collections policy a few months ago to allow a freer use of any funds raised by sales. The new policy, modeled on guidelines negotiated between the New York State Attorney General's Office and the New-York Historical Society, would allow sale proceeds to cover costs of construction, security and air conditioning, for instance.
``If the collection is sold to raise money, that's wrong,'' said former curator Elizabeth Jarvis, one of about eight staffers that the Historical Society of Pennsylvania has let go in recent years. ``As a curator I accepted things from people . . . and I assured a lot of them that we wouldn't dream of selling it or giving it away. It makes me heartsick.''
In addition to staffers being furloughed, four board members have left the society, unhappy over the deaccession policy -- Baldridge, Stephanie Wolf, Dr. Benjamin F. Hammond and Carol Soltis.
Current and former board members also say there was never any vote taken to authorize deaccessioning the entire collection. They also say it was never made clear that the society would seek to sell off most of its artifacts and art.
Board chairman Lewis said the issue was discussed in committee meetings and reports were made to the full board. He said the decision to become only an archive was made two years ago.
``I don't think it's secretive once you've told somebody what you're going to do to go ahead and do it,'' he said.
But board members say those discussions took place with the idea that a new local history center containing the collections of the society, the Atwater Kent Museum and the old Civic Center Museum was a viable possibility. But the history center failed to spark much interest for a number of reasons, and it is widely considered to be an idea on permanent hold.
The state Attorney General's Office is negotiating with the society for an agreement that would restrict the use of sale proceeds. The state wants the society to limit the use of the funds to preservation of its collection and not on general construction or operating costs. Lawrence Barth, senior deputy attorney general, said that he anticipated an agreement fairly soon and that the matter would then move rapidly to a hearing in court.
``We are in the business of protecting the public interest in charities, not in the business of running institutions,'' said Barth. ``The objects will be made available to other charitable nonprofit institutions, so from my office's point of view, there will be no loss to the public.''
Barth did not address the question of possible private purchases of any leftover pieces at public auction.
The view of the Attorney General's Office is seen as constrained, by many who are worried.
``The historical society has a public trust, but it is a private institution,'' said historian Miller, ``and unless the public takes an interest, it can do what it damn well pleases.''
Philadelphia Online -- The Philadelphia Inquirer, Page One -- Copyright Sunday, July 27, 1997
--------------------------------------------------------------
 
German Cops Seize Alleged Stolen Art
 
SAARBRUECKEN, Gemany (AP) Police were checking the authenticity Sunday of two 17th-century Flemish paintings they believe were stolen.
The oils, purportedly by Anthony Van Dyck and Peter Paul Rubens, may have been stolen from private homes in Cologne in 1993 and Berlin in 1987, state investigators said.
Seven people who had offered the works for $1 million were arrested Friday and the paintings confiscated. The seven were released Sunday, police said, although the investigation was continuing.
---------------------------------------------------