Cultural Diplomacy, Italian Style: Rutelli Now in the USA

Italian Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli is in Washington today to hold a press conference and to meet with government officials in the White House, Congress and the State Department, as part of a whirlwind three-city tour. Tomorrow he meets with officials of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and Wednesday he is scheduled to meet in New York with the Metropolitan Museum’s director, Philippe de Montebello, according to a spokesperson for the Italian Culture Ministry.
Presumably, he will be nailing down the specifics of the accords forged between Italy and the two museums, in which Boston and the Met will relinquish objects claimed by Italy in exchange for loans of comparable Italian antiquities, as yet unspecified.
UPDATE: Rutelli and Boston MFA director Malcolm Rogers will hold a press conference tomorrow afternoon “to unveil a major antiquity loaned from Italy” to the Boston museum.
COMING SOON: More details on the battle over the “Getty Bronze.”