Denver Museum to Return Stolen Asian Artifacts

via Denver Post, 17 March 2024: The Denver Art Museum has committed to returning 11 significant antiquities from Southeast Asia, previously associated with indicted art dealer Douglas Latchford and Emma C. Bunker. This decision, rooted in thorough provenance research and international pressure, highlights a growing movement towards ethical art acquisition and repatriation of culturally significant items. Denver is one of the stops in my upcoming lecture tour, I wonder if I might be able to see them artefacts on display before they get deaccessioned.

The Denver Art Museum plans to return nearly a dozen antiquities from Southeast Asia that passed through the hands of indicted art dealer Douglas Latchford or his longtime Colorado collaborator, Emma C. Bunker.

The 11 pieces soon will be repatriated to Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia, senior provenance researcher Lori Iliff wrote in an announcement on the museum’s website Thursday.

All of the objects came from Bunker, who played a critical role in Latchford’s decades-long illicit antiquities trafficking operation, The Denver Post found in a three-part investigation published in 2022.

At least five of the pieces passed through Latchford’s hands originally, the museum publicly acknowledged for the first time by publishing provenance information for each of the objects now being returned.

Source: Denver Art Museum to return antiquities to Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia

See also:

• Return Pending for Deaccessioned Vietnamese Dagger and other Asian Artworks | Denver Art Museum, 14 Mar 2024
• Denver Art Museum to return 11 artefacts connected to smuggler Douglas Latchford | The Art Newspaper, 20 Mar 2024