KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — When Alina Dotsenko returned to her museum after Ukrainian forces retook the southern metropolis of Kherson from Russian forces in late 2022, she discovered 1000’s of artworks had vanished.
“I walked in and noticed empty storage rooms, empty cabinets. My legs gave method, and I simply sat down by the wall, like a toddler,” the Kherson Artwork Museum director stated.
Earlier than Russia’s full-scale invasion in early 2022, the museum held greater than 14,000 works in a set “starting from America to Japan.” Because the Russians retreated, they loaded a lot of it onto vans and took it to Russian-annexed Crimea, in keeping with Dotsenko and video filmed by residents.
The destiny of almost 10,000 items stays unknown.
Ukraine is once more elevating its voice over the looting as Russia seeks to return to the world’s cultural stage. Subsequent month’s Venice Biennale plans to permit Russian representatives to take part for the first time since 2022. Ukraine has stated the occasion “should not grow to be a stage for whitewashing the struggle crimes that Russia commits day by day towards the Ukrainian individuals and our cultural heritage.”
A uncommon documented case of looting
The Kherson case stands out as a result of Ukraine is aware of precisely what was misplaced.
Years earlier than the struggle, Dotsenko started photographing each merchandise within the museum’s holdings, making a digital archive. When Russian forces occupied Kherson, she hid the onerous drives containing it. After Ukrainian troops returned, she retrieved them.
At present, that archive kinds probably the most detailed document of looted cultural property throughout the struggle, permitting prosecutors to work with Interpol to hint lacking works and pursue these accountable.
Throughout a lot of Ukraine, nevertheless, such documentation doesn’t exist. And cultural losses can solely be pursued in courtroom if they are often proved, merchandise by merchandise.
The Russian Tradition Ministry didn’t reply to an Related Press request for touch upon the alleged elimination of things from Ukrainian museums. Prior to now, Russian-appointed officers in occupied territories described the elimination as protecting measures.
Kirill Stremousov, the previous Russia-installed deputy administrator in Kherson who died shortly earlier than Ukrainian forces liberated town, stated eliminated statues would “positively return” as soon as preventing stopped.
Carrying catalogs by means of checkpoints
Halyna Chumak, former director of the Donetsk Regional Artwork Museum, fled Russian-controlled Donetsk in 2014, carrying what she might: catalogs documenting a fraction of the museum’s roughly 15,000 artworks.
She spent a 12 months transporting the catalogs by means of checkpoints into Ukrainian-controlled territory, leaving most behind as she tried not to attract consideration from pro-Russian forces who searched her at every crossing.
These catalogs protecting simply over 1,000 gadgets are the one surviving proof. Greater than a decade later, Ukrainian entrepreneur Oleksandr Velychko is digitizing them.
It took his group over three painstaking months to course of about 400 works. As soon as accomplished, the database will probably be given to Ukrainian authorities, offering a partial authorized foundation to say possession of lacking gadgets.
Prosecutors flip to open-source intelligence
Officers say many instances throughout Ukraine resemble Donetsk greater than Kherson.
Anna Sosonska, deputy head of a struggle crimes unit at Ukraine’s Prosecutor Normal’s Workplace, stated her division is dealing with 23 felony proceedings involving cultural crimes, protecting 174 episodes of looting, injury and destruction.
The Kherson museum case is among the many priorities, she stated, largely due to Dotsenko’s digital archive.
Sosonska stated Russian forces usually take away stock books and different documentation from museums, making it tougher to ascertain what was taken.
Prosecutors generally depend on open-source intelligence, monitoring artworks by means of photographs, public sale data and different on-line traces — a labor-intensive course of that can’t reconstruct complete collections.
It takes time, however Sosonska famous that cultural crimes fall below worldwide legislation and haven’t any statute of limitations.
The dimensions of looting stays unknown
Ukrainian officers say the dimensions of looting far exceeds what will be documented.
In accordance with Ukraine’s Tradition Ministry, Russia as of March had destroyed or broken 1,707 cultural heritage websites and a pair of,503 cultural infrastructure services together with occasions areas and galleries, notably the Mariupol Drama Theatre.
The ministry stated over 2.1 million museum objects stay in Russian-occupied territories. Of the territories Ukraine has retaken since 2022, over 35,000 museum gadgets are confirmed to have been looted.
Massive components of Ukraine have been below Russian occupation since 2014, and far unique documentation has been misplaced, destroyed or eliminated.
Russia has moved to formalize management over seized collections. In 2023, it amended laws to include 77 Ukrainian museums within the occupied Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia areas into its nationwide catalog, a step critics say successfully prohibits the return of looted works.
Appointed as Ukraine’s tradition minister in October 2025, Tetiana Berezhna stated digitalization will probably be a key precedence for her workplace to protect collections.
“If we had digitalized them beforehand, then we might know what number of objects had been stolen and what they seem like,” she stated.
One case of accountability
A latest case in Europe has drawn consideration to the potential for accountability.
In March, a Polish courtroom dominated that Oleksandr Butiahin, a Russian nationwide, will be extradited to Ukraine over allegations he carried out unlawful excavations in Crimea, eradicating artifacts from a web site Ukraine considers its cultural heritage.
Butiahin was detained in Poland final 12 months at Ukraine’s request. The courtroom’s resolution stays topic to enchantment.
Sosonska described the case as the primary time a Russian nationwide might face prosecution for crimes towards Ukraine’s cultural heritage linked to occupied territory.
For museum staff like Dotsenko, the difficulty stays deeply private.
She spoke with The Related Press at an exhibition in Kyiv that includes reproductions of the work taken from the Kherson museum.
“Whereas these works are nonetheless in captivity, all of us hope the state of affairs will probably be resolved in favor of the Kherson Artwork Museum. I didn’t dedicate 50 years of my life to this museum for nothing,” she stated. ——— AP journalist Dmytro Zhyhinas contributed to this report
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