MEMORANDUM
To: Junior Lawyer
From: Senior Lawyer
Re: Potential Timeliness Defense to Claim for Recovery of Artwork
The University Museum of Art ( “University”) has retained us to defend it in a
potential lawsuit related to an item in its collection: a Mesopotamian artifact
known as the Woman of Tigris, a terracotta idol dating to around 2050 B.C.
University is one of the world’s most renowned repositories of Mesopotamian
art, which it has collected over the course of decades from sovereign nations and
private collectors and galleries. In 2006, University acquired the Woman of Tigris
from Johnathan Baines, a well-respected art dealer. Since that time, the idol has
been on public display as part of University’s permanent collection.
On August 3, 2020, the National Museum of Iraq (the “National Museum”) sent
a letter to University claiming that the Woman of Tigris had been stolen from the
National Museum during the American occupation of Iraq in 2003 and
demanding its return under the doctrine of replevin. In April 2003, over 15,000
objects were taken from the National Museum during a 36-hour looting spree
many consider one of the most egregious acts of cultural vandalism in history.
The National Museum and the Republic of Iraq publicized the theft of the
cultural artifacts widely and worked with international law enforcement to
recover the stolen antiquities. As part of that effort, they assembled and circulated
a list of pieces that had been taken from the National Museum, recognizing that
the list could be incomplete given the destruction of records during the American
occupation.
In the two decades since 2003, the United States has repatriated over 1,000
artifacts to Iraq, including a large cache of items returned just last year. In 2016,
University worked with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) to turn
over twenty antiquities in its collection – all of which appeared on the list of
stolen items – that were eventually returned to the National Museum. But until
now, no one has questioned the provenance of the Woman of Tigris. According
to the August 3 letter, the National Museum only discovered the existence of the
Woman of Tigris when one of its longtime curators saw it on the cover of a
University brochure in January 2020. That brochure – which highlighted
University’s vast collection of Mesopotamian art – had been in circulation since
2011.
After its receipt, the National Museum’s August 2020 letter entered what can
only be described as a black hole of administrative inaction at University. During
a time of great turnover in leadership and staffing, the letter appears to have been
left undisturbed for years. Earlier this month, however, a new general counsel
joined University and discovered the August 3, 2020 letter in her office. In a letter
dated August 11, 2023, University responded by refusing the National Museum’s
demand to return the Woman of Tigris. University does not believe the idol was
taken from the National Museum, and indeed, it has never been contacted by ICE
or any other officials about the piece. University’s attempts to fully investigate the
history of the idol has, however, been complicated by Johnathan Baines’s
untimely death earlier this year.
Although University will continue to look into the origins of the Woman of
Tigris, we would like you to research whether we have any timeliness defenses to
the National Museum’s likely lawsuit. In particular, we would like you to assess
whether – given the National Museum’s failure to bring a lawsuit to date–
University has a defense to any potential suit under the New York statute of
limitations.
