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While I'm grateful this is now public, @TheArtNewspaper has done a disservice to Cambodia, Latchford's crimes, its readers, & itself—b/c this article will (& must) be held up as an example of how #colonialism is alive & well in the art market. A thread. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/douglas-latchford-death-of-an-adventurer-explorer
1) W/Latchford's death, @TheArtNewspaper had an opportunity to join the important & ongoing conversation about art, plunder, colonialism, oppression, & injustice. Instead, as @ChasingAphrodit rightly said, it "whitewashed" decades of harm against Cambodia's people & heritage.
2) 'Adventurer scholar'? Indicted suspect, awaiting extradition for crimes that spanned decades and the globe, whose 'scholarship' consisted of a books notorious for being a "Most Wanted" list of stolen Cambodian treasures.
3) Yes Cambodia once honored Latchford, but this article conveniently leaves out that once learning the truth, it actively cooperated w/investigators. Had H.E. Deputy Prime Minsiter Sok An not passed away before his time, RIP, Latchford likely would have been publicly condemned.
4) I found something accurate: "In the 1970s he became one of the most prominent suppliers of Cambodian art to museums and collectors in the US and Europe." But again, as @ChasingAphrodit would say, this "whitewashes" the truth.
5) Saying Latchford "supplied" the market is like saying a rapist "had sex with" his victims. He was a war profiteer who trafficked in "blood antiquities" & capitalized on genocide. A colleague who saw his papers said his words carried as much evil as those she's seen by Göring.
6) The article then accurately quotes my describing Latchford "as a one-man supply-and-demand for Cambodian art for half-a-century," while neglecting to mention I was not interviewed for this article. It makes me wonder who was interviewed?
7) Latchford is described as "a rescuer of works of art which were long abandoned and might have been destroyed." Cambodia's temples were (and are) active places of worship. To a Koh Ker villager, Latchford did destroy these sacred objects, because he forever took them away.
8) Ah the indictment is finally mentioned at the end of the second to last paragraph, although described as if he committed crimes of paperwork.
9) Last, an unnamed "close friend" laments Latchford's collection was made before laws were introduced (easily disproven—see below).
BUT: who doesn't go on the record for their dear friend's obituary?!? https://news.artnet.com/market/opinion-its-time-to-stop-profiting-from-the-killing-fields-148454
BUT: who doesn't go on the record for their dear friend's obituary?!? https://news.artnet.com/market/opinion-its-time-to-stop-profiting-from-the-killing-fields-148454
10) And that here is the one consolation: not one friend or family member went on the record in Douglas Latchford's obituary.
