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weeks. Thereafter it will go to the Pushkin Museum in Moscow for another 8 weeks.

Judging by the enormous popularity of the Scythian exhibition in New York and the wide attention this extraordinary material has received in the national press, it is evident that it had a significant impact on our Nation's cultural life. Scores of thousands of our citizens have come to know something about a fascinating, nomadic culture whose origins were in the third millennium B.C.-insights hitherto available only to a relative handful of scholars and connoisseurs.

I can testify also, on the basis of conversations with officials of the Soviet Ministry of Culture, that they have been highly pleased by the public reception accorded the Scythian exhibition and that their enthusiasm for our paintings exhibition runs very high.

The members of this committee, of course, know that this exchange was singled out for special commendation in the joint communique issued at the summit meeting of former President Nixon and Party Chairman Brezhnev in July of 1974. Thereafter, the U.S.S.R. agreed to be responsible for indemnifying its Scythian treasures sent to the United States.

In the light of this action by the Soviet Government and with the wholehearted support of the Department of State and The National Endowment for the Arts, special indemnity legislation (Public Law 93-476) was passed by the Congress and signed by the President.

Under this bill, our Government agreed to indemnify the Metropolitan for loss or damage (above the amount of $25,000) to our paintings while absent from the museum for their showing in the U.S.S.R.

In effect, then, both Governments acted as indemnifying agents for the works of art sent abroad from their own countries. I should emphasize that this exchange between the Metropolitan and the Soviet Ministry of Culture could not have taken place without this special act of Congress since, in the absence of such indemnification, the cost to us to insure our paintings would have been at least $400,000.

Costs of this dimension would, quite frankly, have been so prohibitive as to prevent such an historic exchange.

Attached, as an indication of the Soviet attitude toward the current exchange with the Soviet Union, a letter signed by Chairman Brezhnev and given to us by Ambassador Dobrynin and Deputy Minister of Culture Popov on the occasion of the opening of the Scythian exhibition in New York.

[The letter referred to follows:]

DILLON STATEMENT

ATTACHMENT ONE

TO VISITORS OF THE SOVIET EXHIBIT IN THE

METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART

In the modern world, exchanges in the field of culture in general, and exchanges of works of art owned by the best museums of the two countries in particular, play an invaluable role in strengthening mutual understanding between our two nations. Taking this into consideration, we commend the initiative taken by the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Leningrad Hermitage, and a number of other museums of the USSR which are trying to make regular exchanges of art exhibits an inseparable part of the cultural exchange between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A.

The Soviet Union, in its desire to acquaint the American people with masterpieces created on the territory of ancient Russia, has sent to the United States unique historical pieces of art. The Metropolitan Museum, in turn, will offer the Soviet people the opportunity this year of seeing a hundred magnificent paintings from its collections of West-European and American art.

We welcome the visitors to the Soviet exhibit in the

Metropolitan Museum of Art and sincerely hope that Soviet-American relations will continue to develop in the interests of the people of both nations and to strengthen peace on earth.

Leonid I. Brezhnev

Mr. DILLON. It is very difficult to say how many potential international exchanges have never come to fruition because of insurance costs. Very few institutions keep records of such things.

However, the Metropolitan Museum was forced at the time of its centennial, in 1970, to cancel arrangements for all the loans of objects from abroad for its exhibition, "Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries." The substantial reduction in the scope of this exhibition, and our subsequent total reliance on objects in our own and other American collections, was directly attributable to an insurance burden of over $500,000 for the objects which we had hoped to bring from abroad. This was a cost the Metropolitan simply could not meet.

I might, in this connection, invite the attention of the committee to two other indenmity arrangements which are currently in effect: one is the U.S. indemnity-Public Law 93-287-written to make possible the exhibition of archeological materials from The Peoples Republic of China which is now in view in Kansas City at The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, following a highly successful appearance here in Washington at the National Gallery. The other is an exhibition mounted by the Museum of Modern Art, including two important paintings from the Metropolitan Museum, which is now on tour in Australia. In this case, the indemnity guarantee has been provided by the Australian Government.

The indemnification procedures followed in these exchanges are patterned largely on indemnity methods employed for more than 15 years by the British Government. Under this system, the British Government agrees to indemnify owners of works of art lent to museums in Great Britain for loss or damage, with the single exception of losses or damages occurring because of war.

We have obtained detailed figures, which are attached, showing the British record under this system for the past 6 years. Works of art valued at approximately $275 million were indemnified with only one loss of over $25,000, which amounted to about $33,500. This is a loss ratio of only slightly over one one-hundredth of 1 percent—a minute fraction of what the cost of insurance would have been. [The attachment referred to follows:]

MR. DILLON'S STATEMENT/Attachment Two

Summary of valuations covered by British Treasury Indemnities for major
exhibitions, 1970-75, and the claims which were paid or are pending
(as reported to the Metropolitan Museum)

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Summary of claims (as reported to the Metropolitan Museum)

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