Kent cultural heritage law specialist Dr Sophie Vigneron has been invited to join an international panel of experts for a debate on repatriation of art.
The debate, entitled ‘Whose Legacy? Museum and Debates of National Heritage’, is sponsored by the European Studies Center at the University of Pittsburgh in the US and is one of a series of virtual roundtables, called Conversations on Europe.
Each online debate connects policy makers, journalists, academics, and students via video conference technology, for an interactive and in-depth analysis of a topical issue in the news.
The next Conversation on Europe, to be held on Tuesday 16 February at 5pm (GMT), will be devoted to the question of a museum’s responsibility to preserve culture and counter arguments in favour of reclaiming art for national or tribal heritage reasons. The debate is expected to cover both American and European museum culture, law, and administrative practices and the recent responses to destruction and plunder by ISIS. A panel of experts from across the world will examine the topic from the perspective of museum curation, art history, anthropology, archaeology, and law. In addition to Dr Vigneron, panellists include:
- Dr Erin Peters, Joint Lecturer in Curatorial Studies, University of Pittsburgh
- Dr Neil Brodie, Senior Research Fellow at the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research, University of Glasgow.
- Dr Susan Frankenberg, Program Coordinator, Museum Studies of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Dr Allyson Delnore, Associate Director of the European Studies Centre (debate moderator)
To register and participate in the live debate, contact Kate Bowersox: kal68@pitt.edu. All Conversations are recorded and made available to watch on the University of Pittsburgh’s website.
Dr Vigneron, a senior Lecturer in Law at Kent Law School, has a particular research interest in the regulation of the art market and in cultural heritage law. She is a member of the Institute of Art and Law, and the Société internationale pour la recherche sur le droit du patrimoine culturel.
Dr Vigneron’s research on cultural heritage law covers both the regulation and protection of cultural objects and the built heritage by national laws (French, English and the USA) and international conventions. She is currently working on a theoretical approach of cultural heritage law as an emerging field of study and has been working with a network of European scholars on a Dictionary of Cultural Property. She is the principal investigator of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) network on the protection of Cultural World Heritage Sites and co-organised an international two-day conference to evaluate the efficiency of national laws, policy mechanisms and management plans that protect World Heritage Sites in January 2015.
Watch the debate on YouTube: