A: Is for Art on Trial

Todays column takes art to a new level. I have always stated that with the outrageous prices that the medium commands, there had to be tax evasion nearby. On Thursday Federal agents raided the Mingei International Museum in Balboa, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena, the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana and the UC Berkeley Art Museum confiscating more than 70 items illegally obtained. This federal investigation involves stolen ancient Thai artifacts and you guessed it, tax fraud. A five-year probe culminated yesterday when agents searched four of the five museums and two Los Angeles-area art galleries. All suspected to some degree of fraud. Sidner and Terri Bryson, the Mingei’s registrar, are named in the affidavit, which links the scams to a single smuggling suspect, Bob Olson of Los Angeles, and Los Angeles art dealer Jon Markell, who owns the Silk Roads gallery with his wife. The affidavit states: Olson and Markell sold stolen Thai artifacts to an undercover agent with the National Park Service who posed as an artifacts dealer, arranging for the agent to donate the items to the Mingei in exchange for a tax deduction.

The items were routinely overvalued by appraisers.

A 10,000-year-old stone ax head, for example, is worth $150 but could be donated to certain museums at an appraised value of $1,000 or more.

But some donations were routinely valued at less than $5,000 so that an appraisal to support the tax deduction weren’t required.

The court records list several examples of donations valued at just under $5,000, including at least three from the undercover agent to the Mingei: $4,985 in June 2006, $4,900 in March 2007 and $4,915 later that month.

No estimates were given for the other museums. Martha Longenecker, the Mingei’s founder, who led the museum until late 2005, was taken aback by the developments. Authorities made more specific allegations in the cases involving the Bowers Museum and the Pacific Asia Museum. Bowers chief curator Armand Labbe is now deceased. The funneled loot suspected of landing at the Mingei comes from the Ban Chiang culture, which existed from 1000 B.C. to about 200 A.D. in northeastern Thailand. The original location of the Ban Chiang culture was named a World Heritage Site in 1992 and is considered the most important prehistoric settlement in Southeast Asia. The first Ban Chiang object had come into the collection courtesy of Labbe, who was a supporter of the Mingei. Labbe introduced Longenecker and Sidner to the Markells, who facilitated other donations of Ban Chiang works. The Mingei is an unusual folk-art museum founded 30 years ago by Longenecker, a San Diego ceramic artist. The word “mingei” comes from the Japanese words for people, min, and art, gei. The museum displays “arts of daily use,” which might be an ornate Mexican plate made by a long-dead craftsman or Japanese origami by a contemporary designer. The museum started collecting Thai objects in 1998. It has amassed dozens of artifacts, including pottery, bronze bangles and bracelets, and shell and stone pieces. The Museum had expected to mount an exhibit, to be called “Ban Chiang, Art of Ancient Thailand,” on March 1. Now, with many of those pieces under investigation, the exhibit is on hold and these are the F.A.C.T.S.