European Court Upholds Italy’s Right To Confiscate Getty Statue

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has upheld Italy’s right to seize a prized ancient Greek statue from the J. Paul Getty Museum.

About the statue

Dating back 300 B.C. to 100 B.C, “Victorious Youth” is a signature piece at the Getty Villa. The feud over this life-sized statue is part of a broader debate on the restitution of cultural patrimony that’s impacting museums worldwide.

Italy has been trying to recover the statue for decades, arguing that it was unlawfully exported. The Getty, in turn, maintains that the statue is not part of Italy’s cultural heritage and that the confiscation order is illegitimate.

In an email statement, a spokesperson for the museum told LAist: “[We] believe that Getty’s nearly fifty-year public possession of an artwork that was neither created by an Italian artist nor found within the Italian territory is appropriate, ethical and consistent with American and international law."

The backstory

In 1964, Italian fishermen discovered “Victorious Youth” (also known as the “Athlete of Fano” or the “Lysippus of Fano”) in the Adriatic Sea. The statue, according to the Getty’s attorneys, was “likely removed from its home in Greece in ancient times by the Romans and sank at sea when en route to an unknown destination in the Roman Empire.”

The Getty Trust bought the statue in Munich in 1977 for nearly four million dollars through a contract concluded in the United Kingdom.

Since then, Italian authorities have made multiple attempts to recover it. In a statement announcing its ruling on Thursday, EHCR said the Getty demonstrated “negligence or bad faith in purchasing the statue.”

What's next

In the email statement, the Getty also said it’s “carefully considering the possibility of requesting a review before the Grand Chamber of the ECHR. If necessary, the Getty will continue to defend its possession of the statue in all relevant courts.”