Jiří Frel (often spelled as Jiri Frel, 1923,
Dolní Újezd,
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...
— 29 April 2006, Paris) was a Czech and American archaeologist. Between 1973 and 1986 he served as a curator for the
J. Paul Getty Museum. He is credited with the expansion of the collection of antiquities of the museum, but he was also involved in a number of controversies, including a tax manipulation scheme to buy artifacts of dubious provenance and purchase of a number of artifacts widely considered to be fake.
Frel was born in Moravia and studied in Paris. He returned to Czechoslovakia after World War II and obtained a doctorate from
Charles University
Charles University (CUNI; , UK; ; ), or historically as the University of Prague (), is the largest university in the Czech Republic. It is one of the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, oldest universities in the world in conti ...
in Prague. Subsequently, he was employed by the Greek and Roman art department of Charles University and taught there. In 1969, following the Soviet invasion, Frel emigrated to the United States. For a short period, he taught at
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
, subsequently worked as an associate curator of Greek and Roman art at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...
, and in 1973, he became the curator of the department of antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum.
During his tenure as curator, Frel considerably expanded the collection of Greek and Roman artifacts, transforming it to one of the leading museums of the world. He also recruited collectors to donate their items to the museum, apparently frustrated by the refusal of the management to buy new items which were not high-profile. To facilitate this, Frel designed a tax evasion scheme in which fictitious donors paid to an intermediary to get tax reductions for donations of artifact they have never seen. The scam was uncovered by
Thomas Hoving, and Frel had to resign in 1984. Before leaving the Getty Museum in 1986 he hired
Marion True, the new curator, who was later charged with laundering stolen artifacts.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Frel, Jiri
Czech archaeologists
Czech art critics
American art curators
1923 births
2006 deaths
People associated with the J. Paul Getty Museum
Classical archaeologists
20th-century American archaeologists
Czechoslovak expatriates in France
Czechoslovak emigrants to the United States
Charles University alumni