Naples, MANN signs enhancement agreements with industrial union and prosecutor's office

In Naples, the National Archaeological Museum (MANN) has been very active in recent days on the front of institutional collaborations, with the signing of two different agreements: the first, last week, with the Naples Public Prosecutor’s Office to enhance the value of works seized from illicit trafficking, and the other, announced on Monday, December 5, with theUnion of Industrialists of the Campania capital to organize joint events and promotional activities.

The first agreement, the one with the Naples Public Prosecutor’s Office, initiates a pilot project with the goal of freeing from seals the hundreds of works of art and artifacts seized in the fight against illicit trafficking that lie in storage and returning them to public study and enjoyment. Signed at the Museum by Prosecutor Rosa Volpe for the Naples Public Prosecutor’s Office, with Assistant Prosecutor Pierpaolo Filippelli (coordinator of the Cultural Heritage Protection Group) and Deputy Prosecutor Vincenzo Piscitelli, and MANN Director Paolo Giulierini, the agreement for the enhancement of this hidden heritage formalized good practices already in place for a year between the institutions with the initiation of the monitoring of 279 files concerning assets entrusted to the custody of the Mann from 1969 to 2017. And the first fruits of the complex work of identification and recovery could soon bring an initial nucleus of these works (Amphorae, coins, rings but also epigraphs, statues, almost all from the Roman period) in the public eye.

In the organizational project of the Naples Public Prosecutor’s Office, the protection of the archaeological heritage of the territory of the Naples district has been identified as one of the most important objectives of a jurisdictional nature assumed by the Public Prosecutor’s Office itself, so much so as to determine the establishment of an autonomous Intersectional Working Group, responsible for investigative activities regarding crimes against cultural, historical and artistic heritage. The activities envisaged by the protocol will enable the Naples Public Prosecutor’s Office, on the other hand, to reconstruct and update, also over time, the geo-criminal map of the conduct of aggression against cultural property and the subjects involved in the territory under its jurisdiction for the purpose of further investigations into trafficking in cultural property in the light of the new and more incisive offenses introduced with Articles 518 bis et seq. of the Penal Code.

“The starting reflection of our project,” said Paolo Giulierini, director of the MANN, “is that national museums ’legally’ hold art artifacts that have converged there, over time, as a result of historical events that are, to say the least, ’traumatic,’ well beyond the scope of law and ethics. One thinks of Greek works stolen from Rome when it became mistress of the Mediterranean. Or to the artifacts from distant lands, such as Egypt, as a result of unclear purchases, military expeditions with addentions, and scientific research. Not to mention, finally, collections derived from episodes of colonialism or imperialism. This aspect, which relativizes the point of view of history, must necessarily lead us to rethink the general concept of the educational function of museums or repositories of beauty strictu sensu: rather we think of cultural institutions as generators of critical consciousness. In our idea of a museum, for example, it will have to be made clear that Alexander’s extraordinary mosaic depicting the climactic moment of the Macedonian king’s charge against Darius III Codomanno is a kind of aesthetic catharsis, a figurative sublimation of a real act of war aggression. It must be clear that the beautiful does not necessarily coincide with the good, and that art is often the siren that softens and sweetens the worst instincts or episodes, turning them almost into myths. If we accept this assumption, the impressive work undertaken with the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Federico II University to survey the many files on archaeological objects seized between the 1960s and the present day is not simply an administrative operation aimed at reorganizing a part of heritage. It is an entry of critical and historical consciousness into a phenomenon as old as mankind, that of art theft, of forgery. The special project will return a first-rate heritage to the civil community and scholars, allowing for exhibitions, permanent displays for ’Museums of Legality’ such as the one proposed by the City of Aversa, specialized publications. I believe, however, that the absolute novelty may come from the explanation of ’why’ such episodes occurred, of the exemplification of the hierarchies of all those links in the chain that see the humble, usually the operational arms, and the powerful, as the port of arrival of the goods, operate. Perhaps with the complacency of some auction houses or museums. Of so many individuals who are untouchable. If we explain that those who illegally steal objects undermine our history and identity, endangering so many jobs of young enthusiasts then we will have already done a lot.”

TheUniversity of Naples Federico II has been working on the project for about a year with the Research Area of “European Law and International Circulation of Cultural Heritage” as part of the activities of the Laboratory on Management, Law, Educational in Cultural Heritage of the interdepartmental center L.U.P.T. with Dr. Daniela Savy (head of the research area) and Dr. Ivana Gallo and Maria Giada Barrella. In synergy with Maria Lucia Giacco in charge of the Exhibitions Office and the Mann Management, the research and study activity concerns the reorganization, digital cataloging and creation of a database. The files examined are in fact corresponding to a large number of works in the MANN’s storerooms, stolen and subject to recovery by prosecutors in the Campania courts with the invaluable help of the Carabinieri’s Nucleo tutela Carabinieri for the protection of cultural heritage.

For Daniela Savy of the Federico II University, “It can be assumed that the traffic examined is not limited to the regional territory, but fits, in some cases not all, into a broad context of national and international illicit trade. Very often, the theft of goods located on the regional territory was ordered by principals located outside the region and sometimes outside the state. Therefore, the fact that they were found on Campanian territory sometimes indicates that the goods were stopped only at the first stage of a long journey and several steps in the network of criminal activity that would take the works across borders.”

As for the protocol uniting MANN and theUnion of Industrialists of Naples, on the other hand, the agreement will unite the two institutions between 2023 and 2025, with three years of joint initiatives to celebrate, in the name of enhancing the territory, the 2,500th anniversary of the founding of ancient Neapolis. The collaboration, promoted by Paolo Giulierini (Director of the Museum) and Costanzo Jannotti Pecci (President of Unione Industriali di Napoli), will have as its keystone the co-organization of events that are ascribable not only to the artistic sphere, but also to the dissemination of “made in Naples” good business practices. The events, open to Italian and foreign citizens, will aim to convey the city’s tourism excellence. In conjunction with the programming of initiatives, also planned special ticketing and launch of season tickets that allow access to the Museum at promo prices. Looking ahead, the extension of the agreement also to Rai and the start of the interlocution with the city municipality and the State Railways.

General rehearsals of the agreement on the occasion of the Byzantine exhibition, which will open at the Museum on December 21: technical tables with trade associations are planned, to find points of connection between ancient craftsmen and current design and goldsmithing productions. Also in the pipeline is the development of a coordinated graphic design for the 2,500th anniversary of Neapolis: through a call for bids, local schools may define the aesthetics of the logo.

“Naples,” comments director Giulierini, “teaches us that we are children of different -foundations-, where seemingly distant worlds meet. Art and industry must come together to promote the city, and the involvement of the Archaeological Museum is not accidental: next May we will open the Roman Technological Section, which will tell the story of how the concept of technology had an essentially multidisciplinary slant in the ancient world.”

“It is necessary to develop an ever more thorough knowledge of the history of our city,” says Costanzo Jannotti Pecci, president of the Industrial Union of Naples. In-depth study of the economic events that have characterized the various eras will also help to enhance the present and direct its prospects. The dialogue between the public and private sectors, in the best declination that can be given to the methodology of a partnership that really builds projects and works together, is decisive to promote a narrative of the territory that goes beyond stereotypes and addresses everyone, especially the new generations."

Pictured is the MANN in Naples.

Naples, MANN signs enhancement agreements with industrial union and prosecutor's office

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