Erin L. Thompson
@artcrimeprof.bsky.social
Art crime prof at CUNY (but opinions here are mine alone). Follow me for how-to tips on art forgery (book forthcoming from Norton), repatriation, monuments, and general museum shenanigans. She/her; queer.
www.artcrimeprof.com
www.artcrimeprof.com
Starting out 2026 strong by writing a letter to the to the London Review of Books editor re: pubic hair in Archaic Greece.
January 1, 2026 at 9:56 PM
Starting out 2026 strong by writing a letter to the to the London Review of Books editor re: pubic hair in Archaic Greece.
My kid: “I’ve read the Calvin and Hobbes books we have a million times. Can we go to the bookstore and get more!”
Me: …
My kid: “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Me: …
My kid: “Why are you looking at me like that?”
December 31, 2025 at 11:17 PM
My kid: “I’ve read the Calvin and Hobbes books we have a million times. Can we go to the bookstore and get more!”
Me: …
My kid: “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Me: …
My kid: “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Every time I start reading a collector's archive, I think "this will be a waste of time - no way did they preserve any incriminating details"... and every time I find they left themselves little notes-to-self like "bought this from a thief at [extremely sacred Nepal site]."
December 30, 2025 at 6:52 PM
Every time I start reading a collector's archive, I think "this will be a waste of time - no way did they preserve any incriminating details"... and every time I find they left themselves little notes-to-self like "bought this from a thief at [extremely sacred Nepal site]."
Archive tech advice, please! How can I improve my captures of prints in plastic sleeves? My previous tries, like below, with iPhone and my meh digital camera, aren't getting all the detail when I zoom in and often have distracting glare from nearly unavoidable overhead lights.
December 28, 2025 at 2:15 PM
Archive tech advice, please! How can I improve my captures of prints in plastic sleeves? My previous tries, like below, with iPhone and my meh digital camera, aren't getting all the detail when I zoom in and often have distracting glare from nearly unavoidable overhead lights.
~ancient art historian voice~ “You know who else liked to show off their bubble butts while playing sports?”
December 27, 2025 at 10:32 PM
~ancient art historian voice~ “You know who else liked to show off their bubble butts while playing sports?”
One last moment in snowy Vermont before I head back to NYC!
December 27, 2025 at 1:15 PM
One last moment in snowy Vermont before I head back to NYC!
My nine-year-old has started a cartoon called "Drunk Santa No Elf" and I couldn't be prouder
December 24, 2025 at 3:34 PM
My nine-year-old has started a cartoon called "Drunk Santa No Elf" and I couldn't be prouder
A student in my class (required research methods seminar for all first-year honors students) snuck this into their final presentation and I'm verklempt/ a little horrified at the thought that I might have just turned a forensic science major into a historian......
December 23, 2025 at 11:19 PM
A student in my class (required research methods seminar for all first-year honors students) snuck this into their final presentation and I'm verklempt/ a little horrified at the thought that I might have just turned a forensic science major into a historian......
Was tested for hyper mobility, which involved the practitioner saying in disbelief “you didn’t know your elbows aren’t supposed to do that?!?” (I didn’t.)
December 23, 2025 at 2:24 AM
Was tested for hyper mobility, which involved the practitioner saying in disbelief “you didn’t know your elbows aren’t supposed to do that?!?” (I didn’t.)
Friends in/knowledgable about Kathmandu: can you tell me more about this sculpture in Maru Tol, identified by Slusser (shown scrubbing it with household cleaner in 1971) as Parvati?
December 19, 2025 at 5:39 PM
Friends in/knowledgable about Kathmandu: can you tell me more about this sculpture in Maru Tol, identified by Slusser (shown scrubbing it with household cleaner in 1971) as Parvati?
My 4th grader, after coming home from a class Zoom with an expert on Frank Lloyd Wright: “I want to live in Falling Water!”
Me, delighted to discover I’m raising an architectural historian: “Oh? Why?”
Kid: “Because the guest house has a full pool!”
Me, delighted to discover I’m raising an architectural historian: “Oh? Why?”
Kid: “Because the guest house has a full pool!”
December 18, 2025 at 1:44 PM
My 4th grader, after coming home from a class Zoom with an expert on Frank Lloyd Wright: “I want to live in Falling Water!”
Me, delighted to discover I’m raising an architectural historian: “Oh? Why?”
Kid: “Because the guest house has a full pool!”
Me, delighted to discover I’m raising an architectural historian: “Oh? Why?”
Kid: “Because the guest house has a full pool!”
I had thought I knew the essentials of this case and hoooo boy I was wrong. Fantastic piece:
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/m...
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/m...
A Revelation Tore Apart Her Fairy-Tale Marriage, and Shocked the Nation
www.nytimes.com
December 17, 2025 at 11:25 PM
I had thought I knew the essentials of this case and hoooo boy I was wrong. Fantastic piece:
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/m...
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/m...
AI is weirdly bad at making convincing selfies.
…at least as demonstrated by the ones a few of my students submitted this semester as “proof” they visited the Metropolitan Museum for an assignment.
…at least as demonstrated by the ones a few of my students submitted this semester as “proof” they visited the Metropolitan Museum for an assignment.
December 17, 2025 at 8:03 PM
AI is weirdly bad at making convincing selfies.
…at least as demonstrated by the ones a few of my students submitted this semester as “proof” they visited the Metropolitan Museum for an assignment.
…at least as demonstrated by the ones a few of my students submitted this semester as “proof” they visited the Metropolitan Museum for an assignment.
Do you want a nail-biter of an impeccably researched heist story with impressive outsmarting of tech and oodles of human stupidity? Of course you do. So, check out Flawless: www.google.com/books/editio...
December 17, 2025 at 4:00 PM
Do you want a nail-biter of an impeccably researched heist story with impressive outsmarting of tech and oodles of human stupidity? Of course you do. So, check out Flawless: www.google.com/books/editio...
Reposted by Erin L. Thompson
When the heist goes wrong
August 26, 2023 at 10:33 PM
When the heist goes wrong
This is incredibly satisfying
December 17, 2025 at 2:33 AM
This is incredibly satisfying
Reposted by Erin L. Thompson
Carol Rosenberg is the empress of the Gitmo press corps, but in her spare time she wrote this deep dive into an instance of the Pentagon’s restoring the names of Confederates to military bases through cynically obvious dishonesty.
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/14/u...
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/14/u...
The Mysterious Life and Afterlife of Private Fitz Lee
www.nytimes.com
December 16, 2025 at 12:52 PM
Carol Rosenberg is the empress of the Gitmo press corps, but in her spare time she wrote this deep dive into an instance of the Pentagon’s restoring the names of Confederates to military bases through cynically obvious dishonesty.
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/14/u...
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/14/u...
A small good thing: @stephenharrigan.bsky.social, fired for discussing slavery in his draft interpretive panels for the Alamo, published this gem of a piece about another artifact on display: www.texasmonthly.com/being-texan/...
Why Pee-wee Herman’s Bike Is Now on Permanent Display at the Alamo
We found it!
www.texasmonthly.com
December 15, 2025 at 12:58 PM
A small good thing: @stephenharrigan.bsky.social, fired for discussing slavery in his draft interpretive panels for the Alamo, published this gem of a piece about another artifact on display: www.texasmonthly.com/being-texan/...
Vegetarian query: any substitutes for the salty, substantial hit of pepperoni on a pizza?
Don’t know why I’m craving this after like 30 years but I am.
Don’t know why I’m craving this after like 30 years but I am.
December 14, 2025 at 10:39 PM
Vegetarian query: any substitutes for the salty, substantial hit of pepperoni on a pizza?
Don’t know why I’m craving this after like 30 years but I am.
Don’t know why I’m craving this after like 30 years but I am.
"I recommend students do not go on to graduate work until they’ve had some success elsewhere" AMEN
"Writing is a social act": a terrific essay on how and why to send work out into the world from my colleague @alexanderchee.bsky.social: querent.substack.com/p/what-do-yo...
"What Do You Do With Your Stories?"
A report from the end of the term, including some thoughts on teaching students to send work out as well as what magazines are even for.
querent.substack.com
December 12, 2025 at 5:43 PM
"I recommend students do not go on to graduate work until they’ve had some success elsewhere" AMEN
Learned an important hidden curriculum lesson: offered to give a student an incomplete; student vehemently said no; student later returned to say they hadn't understood what an incomplete meant and actually, yes, they did want one. (They thought it required retaking the entire class.)
December 12, 2025 at 4:47 PM
Learned an important hidden curriculum lesson: offered to give a student an incomplete; student vehemently said no; student later returned to say they hadn't understood what an incomplete meant and actually, yes, they did want one. (They thought it required retaking the entire class.)
Is it weird to say I had a lot of fun talking with @alletson.bsky.social for @motherjones.com about Trumpian aesthetics? But it was a blast trying to figure out why there’s so much gold when, you know Versailles didn’t end that well for the folks in charge…
www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
Trump's gilded White House makeover is all about power
On this week’s “More To The Story,” art historian Erin Thompson examines the ways societies build and destroy monuments—and why Trump is so focused on remaking Washington in his own image.
www.motherjones.com
December 10, 2025 at 8:40 PM
Is it weird to say I had a lot of fun talking with @alletson.bsky.social for @motherjones.com about Trumpian aesthetics? But it was a blast trying to figure out why there’s so much gold when, you know Versailles didn’t end that well for the folks in charge…
www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
I’m doing a kid’s nonfiction book on art heists and just got the first sketches back from the (brilliant!) illustrator. This is going to be so awesome.
December 10, 2025 at 2:08 PM
I’m doing a kid’s nonfiction book on art heists and just got the first sketches back from the (brilliant!) illustrator. This is going to be so awesome.
Doing a museum heist to grab gold and gems? So boring, so basic. Doing a museum heist to steal a Rembrandt to bargain with prosecutors to reduce your sentence for other art thefts? That's Myles Connor.
hyperallergic.com/the-rembrand...
hyperallergic.com/the-rembrand...
The Rembrandt Thief Who Came Out On Top
Myles Connor is one of the very few people alive to have come out ahead after lifting an artwork from the wall of a museum, as Anthony M. Amore explores in his new book.
hyperallergic.com
December 10, 2025 at 12:19 AM
Doing a museum heist to grab gold and gems? So boring, so basic. Doing a museum heist to steal a Rembrandt to bargain with prosecutors to reduce your sentence for other art thefts? That's Myles Connor.
hyperallergic.com/the-rembrand...
hyperallergic.com/the-rembrand...