Kidnapped at the Getty "Orfeo e le Sirene" returns to Italy

(ANSA) - NEW YORK, AUG 12 - Following a criminal investigation by the New York prosecutor's office, the Getty Museum in Los Angeles will return to Italy a group of life-size terracotta figures illegally excavated in the Taranto area depicting a seated poet and two mermaids.

The group, also known as "Orpheus and the Sirens", "was kidnapped following an ongoing criminal investigation," Matthew Bogdanos, head of the anti-trafficking of antiques, told ANSA.

The statues, which date back to the 4th century BC.

C., were bought for 550 billion dollars in 1976 by the same oilman JP Getty on the advice of the curator of antiquities of the Villa Getty Jiri Frel.

   They will leave for Rome in September, where they will initially be exhibited in the Museum of Salvated Art, announced today the Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini, praising the collaboration between the US investigators and the Nucleo dei Carabinieri for the Protection of Cultural Heritage (Tpc).

Orpheus and the Sirens will then return to Taranto: "They will enrich the archaeological heritage of Puglia", said the governor of the Region, Michele Emiliano.

"The Getty cooperated, but they didn't come forward in the first place. By announcing the repatriation, they left half the truth out," Bogdanos noted.

It has been since 2006 that the statues appeared in a list of artefacts claimed by Italy.

   The investigation "started from the people, the networks of traffickers that include the usual names involved in other events of illegal export of antiques, including the Tarantino Raffaele Monticelli", specified Bogdanos, a former colonel of the Marines also responsible for the return to Italy, which took place a few weeks ago, of other 142 archaeological finds, mostly from the collection of the New York financier Michael Steinhardt.

(HANDLE).