Restitution and the V&A
June 7 2022
Video: V&A
The video above sets out the story of a gold ewer restituted to the Turkish government, apparently by the V&A museum; the video is on the V&A's website, and the V&A's director, Tristram Hunt, is at the handover ceremony. The ewer was acquired in 1989 from an antiquities dealer who, it has since been discovered, was up to no good, handling illegally excavated and exported items from Turkey. So far so commendable.
But, sharp-eyed restitution watchers among you will know that the V&A, much like the British Museum, has traditionally taken the line that it cannot deaccession such items (and especially not historicaly looted items), even if it wanted to; UK law prevents such it. Discussions with the Ethiopian government over items looted by British troops in the 19th Century, for example, have so far only discussed long term loans. For the V&A's own criteria on deaccessioning, see section 4.3 here.
So what's going on? Though the ewer appeared to be part of the V&A's collection, was shown in its galleries, and appeared on their website, it officially formed part of the Gilbert Collection, of works acquired by the late Sir Arthur Gilbert. The Collection originally had its own galleries in Somerset House, but struggled to make the finances work, and in 2009 the collection was 'incorporated' into the V&A. So technically the ewer could be returned.
Why is this interesting? Because I think it gives an insight into how some national museum directors, like Tristram Hunt, would handle restitution requests if the law was changed to allow them to do so. At the moment, the government's response in such cases is to say; 'it's up to museums', while museums say 'it's up to the government'. That at least is the British Museum's mantra. But I detect changes afoot, and hopefully directors like Tristram are working on more flexible procedures behind the scenes. We'll see.
