Laura Young, a native of Texas, contributed to the discovery of a misplaced masterpiece of ancient Roman art with her $35 purchase from a Goodwill Shop there nearly five years ago.
In August 2018, Young bought the marble bust from a Goodwill store in Austin. She saw immediately once that the artwork had to have a rich history because of her background as an antiques buyer. She had no idea that the origin of the bust could be traced back to Rome in the first century A.D.
According to experts from the San Antonio Museum of Art (SAMA), before Young found the figure in the charity shop, it was last seen in a museum in Aschaffenburg, Germany, at the height of World War II . During the conflict, soldiers frequently looted museums said Lynley McAlpine, a postdoctoral curatorial fellow at SAMA.
The question of how it got to Texas is still a mystery.
“Aschaffenburg, which is the German city where the museum was located where this head was displayed, was a strategically important city during World War II for the Germans. And as a result, it was bombed a lot by Allied bombers,” said McAlpine.
“There was definitely a lot of American presence. And so, it seems likely that however, they got hold of [the bust], that some American who was stationed there probably got it and brought it back home with them to Texas somehow,” she said.
Since May 2022 the bust has been on display at the SAMA, drawing audiences both local and international. It will be returned to Germany in May 2023.
