The scandal surrounding the Bohdan and Varvara Khanenko National Museum of Art is gaining momentum. As it became known, since the spring of 2025, the exhibition “Samurai Treasures: Artistic Details of Swords and Miniature Sculpture of Japan” has been held in Vilnius. 512 objects of oriental art from Ukrainian funds were taken there, but only 463 can return.
On May 14, while checking boxes of exhibits, Lithuanian museum workers noticed the absence of 49 items, mostly tsuba (handle guards for Japanese swords) created in the 17th–19th centuries. Among them were unique examples with scenes from "The Tale of Heike", falconry, a monkey reaching for fruit, peasant figures, a boat among coastal grass, writers in bamboo groves, birds on a branch, water lilies, and an anchor among the waves.
Most of the tsuba are made of steel and bronze using forging, casting, engraving, gilding and stone inlay. The insurance valuation of each exhibit ranges from 600 to 3,500 euros, with an average of about 1,000 euros. The most expensive are the tsuba of the Soten school, which have significant artistic and historical value.
After the shortage was discovered, Yulia Samoilova, an authorized representative of the Khanenko Museum in Lithuania, informed the chief custodian of the collections in Kyiv, Olena Kramareva. On the same day, two packed boxes with the “missing” tsubas were found in the Kyiv storage facility, which were never shipped. The museum claims that this was an administrative error on the part of the custodian.
However, the customs office recorded the fact of non-compliance with the declaration: 512 exhibits left through the “Kyiv-Central” point, but 463 were actually sent. That is, 49 items were declared as exported, but physically remained in Kyiv. This formally falls under Art. 201 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (smuggling of cultural values), which provides for up to 7 years of imprisonment.
To export items from the Museum Fund of Ukraine abroad, it is necessary to obtain a certificate from the Ministry of Culture. It is issued for 6 months and provides for only temporary export. In the case of the Khanenko Museum, the documents were drawn up as for “scientific research”, and not simply for exhibition activities. According to sources, this process was managed by officials of the Department of Culture of the Kyiv City State Administration.
On September 12, the director of the department, Serhiy Anzhiyak, sent a letter to the Ministry of Culture, in which he attached an appeal from the museum's director, Yulia Vaganova. In it, she asked to resolve the issue of customs documents and acknowledged that the custodian of the funds had already received an administrative penalty.
According to the instructions of the Ministry of Culture, customs officers were required to verify the number and photos of all exhibits. This was not done. Instead, the Kyiv Customs Office explains: "There were a thousand specimens, who will check them one by one?" The central office of the State Customs Committee of Ukraine emphasizes: "At a time like this, we are obliged to check everything. Two boxes with almost 50 items are a large part of the collection. They could not have been overlooked."
Some experts believe that the situation could have been used as a cover for smuggling - under the guise of "large consignments" of exhibits, foreign cultural values or private collections could have been exported. Others speak of banal negligence, but it also indicates systemic "holes" in customs and possible agreements between cultural officials and customs officers.
Formally, all the tsubas are now in place in Kyiv, but customs are not allowing the collection to return from Lithuania due to suspicions of document manipulation. As a result, 463 exhibits remain “blocked” and may officially be considered illegally exported after the certificate expires.
People's Deputy of the VII–VIII convocations Natalia Novak reminded: "Museum collections are full of fakes. After all, it was a common practice to take paintings from administrations or ministries and return copies. A comprehensive audit is needed."
The story of the missing samurai tsuba from the Khanenko Museum exposed several problems at once:
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imperfection of customs control,
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manual management of cultural processes in the Kyiv City State Administration,
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risks of substitution or illegal export of cultural property.
This scandal could become a catalyst for a large-scale inspection of museum collections and the procedures for their export abroad. Because the main question that worries both experts and society today is: how many original exhibits actually remain in the storage facilities of Kyiv museums?
