By: Benjamin  He

Ilê Sartuzi, 28, a Brazilian art student at Goldsmiths, University of London, strolled into the British Art Museum on June 18th, seemingly content with simply browsing and admiring the various artifacts from around the world. Sartuzi seemed particularly interested in a 17th century British coin, picking up the item and studying it before he eventually put it back.

It wasn’t until later in the day that it was discovered that the coin was actually replaced by a very convincing wax replica, and that the real coin was dropped in the museum donation box. The museum might not have ever caught on had Sartuzi not posted on his Instagram giving himself credit.

Sartuzi had used a slight-of-hand trick for the brief artifact heist. Despite being such a seemingly small accomplishment, the coin heist had actually been in the plans for more than a year, including planning, scouting, and practicing for the real-thing.

On the surface, this scheme might seem little more than a simple prank, but in reality, this was an attempt to dig at the museum’s acquisition methods for its items, which sometimes involves looting and other practices (These include but are not limited to: Excavation, military expeditions, and tomb robbing).

“The gesture of stealing as a central part of the project brings back the heated discussion about the role of looting in the museum’s foundation,” Mr. Sartuzi said afterwards.

Many nations that the museum has taken from have sought the return of their valuable artifacts; these requests have been mostly left unanswered. Criticism has been thrown at the museum regarding its acquisition methods. Questions have been raised about its legitimacy and legality. As author Grace D. Li once said, “For all that people in power claim to care about looting, it doesn’t seem to matter when it’s museums doing it.”

The coin-heist brought back another incident that occurred last year when, quite ironically, a curator stole more than 1,800 items from the museum storerooms.

While the museum didn’t appreciate the stunt, from a legal standpoint, no law had technically been broken. Before Sartuzi had gone through with the plan, he had consulted with an art lawyer to make sure that he wouldn’t get into major trouble. Sartuzi had also visited the museum 20 times in order to plan the heist perfectly. Even the incident that made the news was a second attempt; the first was compromised when the volunteer who gave him the coin asked him to show his hands, and he couldn’t perform the switch.

On the day of the actual heist, three fellow students filmed Sartuzi to record it for his final year project.