"US Colonel Matthew Bogdanos has worked tirelessly throughout his career to protect cultural heritage, recovering thousands of artifacts from across the world. For his extraordinary work at the unique intersection of cultural preservation and military service, he has been awarded the 2026 Marica Vilcek Prize in Art History. "Just as one case closes, another opens," he notes, but does not seem deterred by the endless onslaught of cases to solve."
"Bogdanos's passion for cultural heritage began early in life. At age 12, his mother, then a waitress in the family's Greek restaurant in Lower Manhattan, gave him a copy of Homer's Iliad, which sparked a lifelong devotion to antiquity. In 1980, he earned a bachelor's degree in classical studies from Bucknell University, enrolling in the military while still a first-year student."
Matthew Bogdanos leads the Manhattan District Attorney's Antiquities Trafficking Unit and has devoted his career to recovering and protecting looted antiquities. An early gift of Homer's Iliad inspired a lifelong devotion to antiquity that guided academic studies in classical studies, law, and strategic studies. In April 2003 he led a multiagency recovery at the Iraq Museum in Baghdad, recovering more than 9,000 pieces from eight countries and securing items such as a 4,500-year-old hammered gold helmet. He received the 2005 National Humanities Medal, donated royalties from Thieves of Baghdad to the Iraq Museum, and was awarded the 2026 Marica Vilcek Prize in Art History. He warns that erasing historical identity precedes erasing peoples.
Read at Hyperallergic
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