Give us our art back!

Skim (and I do mean skim) this article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/29/arts/29iht-loot.html?ref=arts


Now here's my tangent. . .if you were a museum collections manager, curator, or director, and were approached by a family/country that wanted its artwork back (I say country because of all of the works stolen from national collections in WWII), and the provenance (history of the work's location) proved it to be truly from this family/country, what are some reasons you would NOT give it back?  We're playing Devil's Advocate here.  And note, there are plenty of works in American museums that have been stolen from other countries, but possibly unknowingly to the museum. 

Image from the blog "Stolen Vermeer"

http://stolenvermeer.blogspot.com/2007_10_01_archive.html

Who creates value?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaFbmuEUdwI&feature=player_embedded

Watch the video.  Have a snack or a drink and let its languid pace start you thinking, not just about museums, but about all the arts, especially the ones you want to manage.  Who creates value?  How?  What is the role of the arts manager (perhaps more than you might think?) in creating value and 

in deciding what we want to remember and what we want to forget?

 

--Mike