Turkey has asked for the return of what it calls cultural patrimony, sparking international debate about who owns antiquities after centuries of shifting borders. Major museums such as The Met, The Getty, The Louvre and The Pergamon in Berlin are being asked to return works from their collections to Turkey under a 1906 Ottoman law that banned the export of artifacts, even though Turkey ratified the Unesco convention in 1981, which allows museums to acquire objects that were outside their countries of origin before 1970. (more…)

Alessandro Vezzosi, the director of the Museo Ideale Leonardo da Vinci, and the Zurich-based Mona Lisa Foundation will unveil what could be the Isleworth Mona Lisa in Geneva on Sept 27th. It is owned by a Swiss-based consortium, who says that the version is the first of the famous portrait. In contrast to the Louvre‘s Mona Lisa dated ca. 1503-06, this work is on canvas and some formal aspects of the composition differ. Experts will decide whether the work is from the studio of Leonardo da Vinci or a copy from the late 16th century. (more…)