Theft has become a recurring theme surrounding the British Museum, as the 270-year-old institution has been embroiled in a number of scandals in recent years. To start, there are longstanding repatriation efforts targeting the museum for the return of artifacts that have allegedly been looted centuries earlier, from the Benin Bronzes to the Parthenon Marbles.
Just as notable is the case of Peter Higgs, the former curator of Greco-Roman art, who was caught stealing over 1,800 artifacts from the museum's collection and selling them on the black market and e-commerce sites, such as eBay.
To add to this growing list, The Art Newspaper reported that Brazilian artist Ilê Sartuzi stole a historic coin minted in 1665 and later dropped it in the museum's donation box in a somewhat Oceans 12-like moment. The artist actually filmed the whole incident in a seven-minute video now dubbed Sleight of Hand, which was on view at his Goldsmiths exhibition which ended today.
Courtesy of the artist
Sartuzi had planned the whole "heist", if you want to call it that, a year in advance — enlisting several friends to help record the incident, which first occurred last month on June 17, then again the following day, where the artist shaved his beard to conceal his appearance. At the core of his efforts was the aim to emphasize “the problem of universal museums," stating that the British Museum is one of the many cultural institutions that continue to serve as “a foundational part of the colonial, imperialist system."
Surprisingly, the coin is not registered in the museum's database and can actually be touched by visitors as part of an initiative started in 2000 to allow people to handle objects under volunteer supervision. “This is a disappointing and derivative act that abuses a volunteer-led service aimed at giving visitors the opportunity to handle real items and engage with history,” a British Museum rep said in a statement. “Services like this rely on a basic level of human decency and trust, and it would be a shame to have to review the provision of these services due to actions like this.”
At the time of writing, it's unclear whether the British Museum will press charges, but Sartuzi and his lawyer maintain that the artist did nothing wrong.
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