The Cleveland Museum of Art is forging another agreement for cultural exchange, centered around the return of a statue. On Thursday, museum director William M. Griswold formally signed the agreement, laid out last year, alongside Mohammed Faraj Mohammed Al-Fallos, chair of Libya’s Department of Antiquities.
“We deplore the illicit, unscientific excavation of archaeological material and ancient art,” Griswold said. “We condemn the theft and unlawful sale of such objects. The museum is committed to the responsible acquisition of ancient art according only to the highest standards of professional practice.”
The 22-inch black basalt figure, thought to have been carved in Egypt during the Ptolemaic Dynasty, will stay in Cleveland for another five years. Libyan officials contacted CMA in 2023, asking for acknowledgement that the sculpture had been taken from a museum in Libya during the British occupation in World War II. Museum researchers compared the statue to photos from a 1950 book, and concluded that it “rightfully belongs to Libya.”
Al-Fallos lauded museum officials for their “moral attitude” in making the determination.
“Our agreement today will go beyond the artwork,” he said, through an interpreter. “It is about cooperation between our government… and the museum. So, there will be an exchange of not only pieces of art but also of all kinds of knowledge and information.”
The museum’s curator of Greek and Roman art, Seth Pevnick, said he cannot place a value on the piece. He believed it’s the first time that Libya’s Department of Antiquities has lent an object to an American museum.
The statue was donated to in 1991 by noted art dealer Lawrence A. Fleischman, owner of the Kennedy Galleries in New York. He’s thought to have acquired it in 1966. He’s listed as the source of two other pieces in CMA’s online catalog: a bronze tripod base and a statuette of Dionysos. Fleischman passed away in 1997.
The move comes just weeks after the museum agreed to return a statue to Turkey that had been ordered seized in place by a New York judge in 2023.
