Posted on: September 11, 2017 by Emily Gould
“Scientists shoot rocks!” This was the opening line of a fascinating discussion exploring innovative methods of evidencing the destruction of cultural heritage in conflict zones held at the V&A last Friday evening (8 September). The event was part of the V&A’s ‘Culture in Crisis’ programme which seeks to raise awareness of the need to protect […]
Posted on: August 9, 2017 by Emily Gould
As promised in our post last week, having looked at developments in the fight against heritage crime in the UK, we’re now turning our attention to the international context. We were considering in particular a number of interesting developments across a range of disciplines: the law, military practice, technology and community engagement. As regards the […]
Posted on: July 31, 2017 by Emily Gould
Rarely a day goes by, it seems, without another concerning and saddening story about cultural heritage destruction. Whether it is the devastation of ancient sites in war-ravaged states such as Syria, Libya or Yemen or the ruin of yet another village church in the UK through lead theft, the loss is felt far and wide, […]
Posted on: May 18, 2017 by Emily Gould
Tomorrow (Friday 19th May), a new convention intended to tackle international cultural property crime will be opened for signature by the Council of Europe (the ‘CoE’, Europe’s leading human rights organisation, including 47 member states, set up to promote democracy and protect human rights and the rule of law in Europe; not to be confused with […]
Posted on: May 9, 2017 by Geoffrey Bennett
On the year marking the 20th anniversary of the modernisation of treasure law in England, a case has come to light serving as a throwback to the earlier law of ‘treasure trove’. The Treasure Act 1996, implemented in 1997, marked a significant advance on the previous law. The definition of ‘treasure’ under the Act is […]
Posted on: April 8, 2017 by Alexander Herman
Well done to all the students on our Diploma in Law and Collections Management course (DipLCM) that finished last week in Sydney. We were happy to see that participants hailed from a variety of institutions throughout both Australia and New Zealand. A very good dynamic within the group; and we probably learned as much from the class […]
Posted on: February 28, 2017 by Alexander Herman
In Yasmina Reza’s 1994 play ‘Art‘, three male friends spend much time discussing the question, ‘What is art?’ The reason is that one of the characters, Serge, has bought a work from a popular contemporary artist that is more or less just a white canvas. More or less, because there is some debate as to whether […]
Posted on: February 23, 2017 by Emily Gould
*Update: On the day of going to press, we later discovered that, with impressive speed and efficiency, the Bill received Royal Assent, so look out for further posts on the Cultural Property (Armed Conflicts) Act 2017! As of this Monday (20 February) the UK is now one step closer to ratifying the 1954 Hague Convention […]
Posted on: December 20, 2016 by Emily Gould
Just to let everybody know that IAL friend Stik has managed to raise £35,000 for the Magpie Social Centre in Bristol through the sale of a street art piece, entitled ‘Magpie’. Stik had originally painted the piece on the wall of the building occupied by the Centre in 2009. The Centre is a community arts […]
Posted on: December 6, 2016 by Alexander Herman
For those who were not aware, there have been two major obituaries of our Academic Principle, Norman Palmer QC CBE, in the UK press. The first appeared in The Times on 3 November and the second appeared on The Guardian website on 17 November (paper edition on 2 January 2017). In addition, in order to remember his […]