The leveling of the tomb of Jonah (think: whale) in Mosul, Iraq, last July, was a striking reminder of the fragility of our collective cultural inheritance. Have we nearly come full circle? In 1943, as Nazi Germany laid waste to much of Western Europe, Monuments Men-a handful of soldiers whose job it was to protect cultural heritage during wartime-were dispatched to Europe, for the first time in history.

Deane Keller, a painter and professor of art at Yale University, was among them. On Sunday, December 7, 2014, at 1 p.m., the New Haven Museum will open a special exhibit, "An Artist at War: Deane Keller, New Haven's Monuments Man," celebrating Keller's life, his contributions to Connecticut culture, and the preservation of many of the world's most iconic works of art.

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Source: http://www.courant.com