The Icon Hunter

February 27, 2017
In this gripping memoir, Hadjitofi, former Honorary Consul of Cyprus in the Netherlands and founder of the NGO Walk of Truth, chronicles the Munich sting operation that uncovered and repatriated stolen artifacts and icons looted from Cypriot churches during the Turkish occupation of Cyprus in 1974. The sting that led to the “Munich Case” lasted more than two decades. Hadjitofi recounts her quest to locate scattered Byzantine masterpieces that are worth millions; she went all over the world, from a university in Japan to the Munich doorstep of a corrupt art trader. She partnered with Dutch art trader Michel Van Rijn, a corrupt and unreliable informant, who introduced danger along the journey. Hadjitofi felt driven to return the artifacts to the Orthodox Christian churches that represent both her religion and her home. As a former refugee, she reveals the despair and irreparable loss of losing not only a nation but also its cultural heritage. She exposes the “underworld of art traffickers” with intricate detail as she documents all the legal loopholes and battles that stand in the way of repatriating stolen artifacts. The book is a powerful and important chronicle of art trafficking and its impact on the lives of those torn apart by war, and Hadjitofi is a caring and exacting storyteller.

March 1, 2017
A Greek Cypriot refugee in the Netherlands chronicles her fierce determination to return stolen artifacts to her country through years of dangerous underworld operations.Having fled her hometown of Famagusta, Cyprus, at age 14 with her family when the Turkish military invaded the country in 1974, Hadjitofi relocated to The Hague and became, in her early 20s, a businesswoman and honorary consul to her country. While there, she was approached by a Dutch art dealer with a special interest in Byzantine icons and religious paintings, many looted shamelessly from the hundreds of ancient churches located in the occupied area of Cyprus after the Turkish invasion. In this detailed narrative, rendered in occasionally stilted English, the author moves back and forth in time to give a sense of her life in Cyprus before the invasion among her intensely pious Christian community, and she shows how crucial to their religion these icons were. She re-creates the time she was first approached by the dealer, Michel Van Rijn, in 1988; he held out to her tantalizing possibilities of retrieving many sacred icons from Aydin Dikmen, a Turkish dealer with whom he maintained shadowy dealings. In return, she and her country would have to come up with staggering amounts of money. Over more than 10 years, Hadjitofi managed to use the highly volatile Van Rijn to get at Dikmen through an extensive undercover sting operation. Her adventures took her to Munich and London and Cyprus, and she effectively kept the police at bay to lure Dikmen into the trap and the ultimate discovery of priceless artifacts. The author's work is also a personal memoir, not only of her life in Cyprus, but also of her struggles as a young woman trying to start a family and maintain her IT business, Octagon. Her journey is endearing, and she brings the plight of the Cypriots into sharper focus. An intimate trek into the venal world of art looting and selling.

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March 15, 2017

As a child, Hadjitofi was forced to flee her home in the Mediterranean island of Cyprus as a result of the 1974 Turkish invasion. After taking refuge in the Netherlands, the author later became a businesswoman and Honorary Consul of Cyprus. This autobiography focuses on her diplomatic efforts to find and recover treasured religious icons, frescoes, and other valuable artworks which were looted from Orthodox churches after the attack. The author's negotiations with Dutch art dealer and informant Michel van Rijn eventually led to a 1997 police sting operation in Munich, where Turkish art thief Aydin Dikman was caught with a large cache of priceless stolen Cypriot artifacts. While Hadjitofi's deep dedication to recovering the cultural heritage of her homeland is admirable, this recounting is exhaustive in detail and includes long sections of re-created conversations. Hadjitofi fails to condense her labyrinthine discussions with van Rijn into a reasonably readable form, and the larger threads of her potentially compelling narrative are often obscured by a blizzard of extraneous information. VERDICT Best suited to readers interested in Cypriot history, high-end art trafficking, and the daunting challenges of protecting cultural heritage in conflict zones.--Ingrid Levin, Salve Regina Univ. Lib., Newport, RI

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