Scholarly opinion or elaborate ruse? Antiquities experts linked to case of looted Cambodian relics

[geovalin]

Ralph Blumenthal and Tom Mashberg, The New York Times

They have long been oddly far-flung collaborators. She was a Colorado museum consultant known for her esoteric lectures on ancient gold adornments or nomadic Chinese tribes. He was a buccaneering Bangkok art collector who trekked through Cambodia’s war-ravaged jungles in the 1970s, exploring moss-encrusted temples built a thousand years earlier, during the heyday of Khmer civilisation.

 

Over the course of a 30-year friendship, Emma C Bunker, 87, and Douglas AJ Latchford, 86, became authorities on Southeast Asian antiquities whose approval could ensure an object’s value and legitimacy. Together they wrote three seminal volumes – Adoration and Glory: The Golden Age of Khmer Art, Khmer Gold and Khmer Bronzes – that are core reference works for other experts.

 

The books contain letters of tribute from Cambodian officials who applaud the pair’s dedicated research and support for the National Museum in Phnom Penh. In particular, they hail Latchford, who has donated rare artefacts and money to the museum, acts of generosity that led the government to knight him in 2008.

 

read more http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/scholarly-opinion-or-elaborate-ruse-antiquities-experts-linked-case-looted-cambodian-relics

 

 

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