Going, Going, Gone...

In a landmark victory for the repatriation of antiquities, the Italian government has managed to secure an agreement from the Metropolitan Museum of New York, that valuable pieces currently in the museum's possession, especially the Sarpedon krater attributed to the fifth century Attic Red-Figure painter Euphronios, will be returned to Italy if proof of illegal theft can be provided.

Euphronios is my favourite Attic Red-Figure artist and I've followed this story for a while simply because it's going to have a large impact on the futures of a lot of museum collections worldwide. The Euphronios krater in New York set records in 1972 when it was purchased from an antiquities dealer for more than $1 million US dollars. This event of course caused a surgence in the use of the underground illegal antiquities market, a battle against which has been waged for decades.
The provenience of this particular vase has always been an issue and it is almost certainly known that it was looted from an Etruscan tomb in Cerveteri. Of course it has changed hands many times on its journey to the Met and who knows if there is a conclusive paper trail that can be used to attain a return, but things are starting to look promising. I believe that this artifact is also a major prize possession for the Met so it must be a bit of a blow, although if they play their cards right it seems the Italian government will be willing to negotiate long term loans with them.

The repatriation of artifacts has caused a lot of contention between nations in recent years and this is only the beginning of an important story that has been gaining a lot of momentum in the past year starting with the Getty Museum in LA repatriating some of their illicit antiquities last fall.
And so it begins, ceramics, statues, and silver returning one day, perhaps Parthenon marbles some day? One can never predict what will happen and while Greece isn't anywhere near the position of power that Italy has fought for, maybe someday it will be.
Read a full account of the details here.