Dr Christa Roodt is a senior lecturer in History of Art at the University of Glasgow and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Her postgraduate teaching focuses on provenance, reparative justice and cultural heritage in the global market. She has published widely at the crossover between Public International Law, Private International Law and Ethics. Her most recent work addresses the challenges of the restitution and repatriation of cultural property and the law. 

Chair Jane Suzman and Vice-Chair Professor Paul Cartledge along with Honorary President Professor Anthony Snodgrass and the 15 members of BCRPM welcomed Dr Christa Roodt to the committee on the 12th of April 2021. 

The ownership history of the Parthenon Sculptures in the British Museum hinges on interpretations of law and ethics. The political and moral conversation needed for their return to Athens will soon have the support of a new Charities Act of 2022 to complement the Charities Act of 2011. This legislation empowers the trustees of statutory charities such as national museums to deaccession property on ethical or moral grounds even without a legal obligation to do so. Loosening the strictures of national museum legislation and case law standing in the way of the restitution of looted artefacts to the country of origin is a welcome and significant development. It gives the British Museum the leeway necessary to return cultural property and heritage that had been stolen, looted, implicated in forced sales, or otherwise taken due to power imbalances that fostered unequal relationships. 

Dr Christa Roodt is a BCRPM member and Senior Lecturer: History of Art,  Research Integrity Advisor: School of Culture and Creative Arts, Deputy Dean Internationalisation: College of Arts

More on this news in the Guardian and artnetnews.