Raiders of the Lost Art
Bruce Doar

A confrontational 'treasure hunting team' sponsored by the Chinese government and tailed by a Chinese media crew crowded into The Metropolitan Museum of Art and a dozen other major museums in the US over a 20-day period in November and December 2009 demanding, among other things, proof of the provenance of many Chinese objects on display. The team's abrasiveness at the Met was only briefly sustained, and they left wreathed in smiles; James C. Y. Watt, the head of the museum's Asian art department, wryly commented to The New York Times: That wasn't so bad after all!' (17 December 2009) The team was reportedly casing out 'loot' from China in major museums in the northeast US, as part of a media exercise for home consumption highlighting the Chinese government's concern for the fate of the nation's patrimony, and for that of the Yuanmingyuan, the Old Summer Palace, in particular.