Art Crime

by John E Conklin

Overview

This is the only book by a criminologist to look at the full range of crime involving works of art: forgery, fraud, theft, smuggling, and vandalism. It is up to date, drawing on much material from the boom years of the art market in the 1980s and continuing up through the 1990s, and assimilating information from a variety of sources: art magazines, newspaper accounts, and the relatively small amount of scholarship on art crime by art historians and criminologists. In addition to considering the motives of thieves, the book looks at the way art theft is socially organized: the types of thefts that are committed, the ways thieves locate art to steal and how they gain access to it, their use of insiders and fronts, and the way they launder stolen art. The relationship between art theft and organized crime, especially drug traffickers, is investigated. After looking at explanations of art vandalism and the way vandals explain their behavior, the book concludes with a consideration of policies to curb art crime. The entire book is written in a highly entertaining way, packed with case studies of numerous crimes and stories of smuggling, grave-robbing, and skullduggery, that will appeal to a general audience as well as professionals and academics in criminology, sociology, and art history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780275947712
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	03/30/1994
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.88(d)
Lexile:	1460L (what's this?)

About the Author

JOHN E. CONKLIN is Professor of Sociology at Tufts University. He is the author of a successful textbook, Criminology (Fifth Edition will be published in 1995), as well as Sociology: An Introduction (1987, 1984), Illegal but Not Criminal: Business Crime in America (1977) The Impact of Crime (1975)

bbery and the Criminal Justice System (1972)

and editor of The Crime Establishment: Organized Crime and American Society (1973).

Table of Contents

Introduction
The Value of Art
Fakes and Forgeries
Fraud
Art Theft: Opportunities and Motives
The Social Organization of Art Theft
The Distribution of Stolen Art
Vandalism
Curbing Art Crime
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

Criminologist Conklin (Tufts U.) looks at the full range of crime involving works of art: forgery, fraud, theft, smuggling, and vandalism. In addition to considering the motives of thieves, he looks at the way art theft is socially organized: the types of thefts that are committed, the ways thieves locate art to steal and how they gain access to it, their use of insiders and fronts, and the way they launder stolen art. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

Criminologist Conklin's engaging and informative study of crime in the art world is the most thorough examination of this complex subject to appear in years. Art crime includes forgery, fraud, theft, smuggling, and vandalism of fine art, antiquities, and ethnographic objects; more often than not, it goes unreported. Experts hate to admit to being fooled by forgeries; dealers and collectors often indulge in fraud to inflate value but control costs; and many thefts are actually commissioned. Conklin describes examples of each type of art crime and, in the volume's most innovative sections, analyzes the social organization of the art world and the methods by which its denizens establish the value of art. It's curious that although art is treasured as an expression of humanity's spirituality, making art crime almost a sacrilegious act, art is also perceived merely as an investment just like gold, stocks, or bonds, thus arousing greed and dishonesty. Conklin goes on to track the skyrocketing of art prices over the past three decades and to characterize the modus operandi of art thieves and fraudulent dealers. He concludes by suggesting policies for combating art crime, an international phenomenon that has been growing exponentially.

Donna Seaman