Questions on missing art

By Maureen Morrissey

At least 12 art works in the Student Association Art Collection, including an original Andy Warhol print signed by the artist, are reported missing or stolen.

The Warhol print, “Mao Tse Tung,” and three other works have been identified as stolen. No one in the SA, University Programming and Activities or Campus Activities Board knows if the other works were stolen or the collection’s value.

UP&A Director Michelle Emmett said CAB, which oversees the collection, “is in the process of finding some of the missing pieces around campus.”

A list of the stolen and missing art, “which has been gone for 10 to 15 years” said Lisa Petersen, UP&A graduate assistant, was given to SA President Huda Scheidelman this summer.

Tanya Smith, an SA senator and the CAB liaison, said at Sunday’s SA meeting “they (CAB) basically don’t know about prices or where they are.”

CAB does not have an inventory of the collection, but is in the process of compiling one, said CAB President Brett White.

Scheidelman said she is “concerned that CAB is not doing their job. Not having a complete list is unacceptable.”

Collection curator Marie Castro said CAB does not know where all the works are “because for the last four years or so, no record has been kept” on the pieces’ location.

Currently, CAB has a 65 percent inventory of the collection, Castro said. “We know where another 10 percent could be (because of past records), but we are not sure about the other 25 percent,” she said. “I am pretty sure we can find everything.”

Cam Davis, SA supreme court justice and former SA vice president, said he “doesn’t know what happened. It was my understanding an inventory had been completed” when he held office two years ago.

White said he hopes CAB “will have the list completed by the end of the semester. White said no works have been stolen recently and he does “not know what to do about past losses” adding he is “open for suggestions.”