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Officials of the Louvre Museum in Paris have been the target of violent criticisms following the theft of a painting by Camille Corot on May 3rd 1998 and are now taking stiff measures which have resulted in the closing of several rooms which do not meet security requirements.
Minister for Culture Catherine Trauttmann lashed at the Louvre officials and said security in museums was an absolute priority.
Museum officials were deeply shocked following the theft of a small landscape by Corot, titled «Chemin de Sèvres» on a sunday at noon. The thief managed to get away despite intensive measures with thousands of people being searched at the exits of the Louvre.
The following day the staff was in a state of trauma and the Chairman of the museum, Pierre Rosenberg, could only say that «thefts were part of the sad destiny of the Louvre», a statement which gave authorities the feeling that nothing could be done about such crimes.
The museums had been the target of several thefts and acts of vandalism in the space of five years and swift measures have now been under study to stop the haemorhage.
The theft of the Corot painting was a real shock and triggered vital questions notably about the opportunity of leaving opened some 13,000 square metres of exhibition rooms while organising a dozen temporary exhibitions and giving free access to the public on sundays.
As a result the head of the security at the Louvre was forced to give his resignation because his views did not tally with those of other officials regarding the measures that should be taken.
Pierre Rosenberg reckoned that the question of security had not been fully studied when the Louvre was renovated.
He however said that renovation works had been going on for 15 years with new rooms opened without having the possibily of taking a breath.
A security audit will therefore be conducted in the weeks to come so as to pinpoint the security weaknesses of the museum. Already weekly meetings have been taking place since May 15th 1998 to discuss security problems between all parties involved. One thing is for sure, the museums needs more staff for surveillance purposes, more electronic devices to protect paintings and objects and more attention from wardens who have been accused of being inefficient by the police and the press.
Each room has been checked carefully to detect any security failures and as a result several exhibition sites have been closed to the public, notably the room where are exhibited primitive Italian paintings from the 12th to the 15th centuries.
All alarm systems have been undergoing tests and new devices have been progressively fitted to some important works. Still, many works are being left without any clear protection and critics have been quick to note that whereas it is impossible to get out of the library with a single book it is still possible to rob an important painting from the museum and leave the premises undetected.
The museum will not be completely safe until all security measures are taken and this will take time and cost a lot of money, officials noted. The Minister in charge of Culture have however promised to allocate a budget for security purposes.
In the meantime, temporary exhibitions have been cut down and only one, titled «mummies of ancient Egypt» will take place from July 1998 until April 1999 while officials will concentrate on a reinforcement of security measures.
The great ambition of the museum was to open all its exhibition rooms to the public but such project will be abandoned to the dissatisfaction of many art amateurs.
Over 5 million people visited the museum last year and despite a US $ 110 million annual budget the Louvre has so far failed to meet normal security standards.
Before the musuem was renovated security measures were practically non -existent because wardens were not trained to keep an eye on exhibition rooms in a professional way. When the new premises were inaugurated things did not change much with visitors using flashes while taking photos, carrying bags in the museum compound and worse touching objects without being reprimanded.
Wardens are not well paid (between US $ 1,100 and 1,600 a month) and are facing a boring daily routine. One of them said it was a nightmare staying all day in front of Leonardo da Vinci's Joconda among a crowd of visitors packing before the famous painting. The best way would be to have shifts to avoid the job being monotonous. Officials have admitted that electronic devices will never replace any human presence required for surveillance purposes while the 990 wardens (100 work at night) working in the museum have been calling for the hiring of at least 100 people to improve security.
Some 5500 thefts of objects of art and paintings - including 23 in French museums and 225 in churches which are mostly unprotected- were recorded last year in France and police officials said they could not understand why the security panel which had been set up for museums in the early 1980's had been dissolved in 1994. As a result thefts took place quite recently in the Museums of Fontainebleau, Compiègne and of Ecouen where many Renaissance pieces disappeared. Police regretted that museum officials had not considered security as a daily preoccupation because thefts were no longer carried out by lonely maniacs but rather by specialised gangs which found outlets to dispose of stolen works of art such as those thieves who stole from the Museum of Semur en Auxois in 1984 some paintings by Corot which were traced back two years later in Japan. Adrian Darmon
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