Re-writing history of loot: Australia's national gallery to return stolen Cambodian artefacts
Cambodian artefacts which will be returned by Australia.
The national gallery of Australia is set to return to Cambodia three 9th and 10th Century bronze sculptures, which were found to have been stolen. The step has been taken after a decade-long investigation was carried out by the two nations to find the origin of the works.
The government of Cambodia welcomed the historic move as "an important step towards rectifying past injustices".
This comes amid a push on global platforms to return looted cultural goods. Originally, the three artworks came from the Champa Kingdom, which once included Vietnam and parts of Cambodia.
The National Gallery of Australia (NGA) stated that the sculptures were purchased by it from British artefacts smuggler Douglas Latchford in 2011 for A$2.3m (£1.18m; $1.5m).
Latchford was implicated in antiquities' illegal trade since 2016, as per the NGA, as he faces charges of allegedly trafficking stolen and looted Cambodian artefacts in 2019.
As per the ABC, the three statues were excavated from a field in Tboung Khmum in the east of Cambodia in 1994 before weresmuggled to international art dealers in Thailand and finally reached Latchford's collection.
Artefacts to be displayed at NGA in Canberra
Latchford's daughter Nawapan Kriangsak has worked along with researchers from Cambodia's Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts and the NGA to help return the goods.
The works will be put on display at the NGA in Canberra for three years as Cambodia makes preparations for its new home in Phnom Penh.
"It is an opportunity to put right a historical wrong but also to strengthen our ties and deepen our understanding," said Australia's Special Envoy for the Arts Susan Templeman, at a handover ceremony on Friday (August 4).
Cambodia has time and again called on international governments for recovering thousands of antiquities it said were stolen from its ancient temples, several of which it claimed were present in the Victoria and Albert and British Museums.
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It is the second time, a stolen art has been removed by the NGA from its collection in recent years.
The gallery in 2021 returned many artefacts to India, few dating back to the 11th Century which had links to the late New York art dealer William Wolff and alleged antiquities smuggler Subhash Kapoor.
Globally, efforts are being made to continue to repatriation of antiquities, which are culturally significant, to their original owners.
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