Many large museums around the world now live in fear of artefacts being removed from their collections, despite the fact, that in many cases the museums themselves are fully aware of the dubious provenance of the works in question.

From:
Chicago Tribune

Posted on Thu, Dec. 19, 2002
Museums balk at returning art objects acquired centuries ago
BY WILLIAM MULLEN
Chicago Tribune

(KRT) – Art museums have been asked to return works stolen by Nazis from wealthy Jews. Native Americans have demanded the return of human remains and sacred objects taken without permission from their ancestors and now in the hands of history museums.

If at first these museums balked at losing some of their most treasured possessions, they soon bowed to both laws and public opinion and repatriated many artifacts.
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Greece is proceeding with the construction of a new museum to house the Parthenon Sculptures, despite the fact that the British Museum is showing now signs of relenting in their attempts to keep the contested artefacts in their collection.

From:
United Press International

The Art World: Pesky Parthenon marbles
By FREDERICK M. WINSHIP
From the Life & Mind Desk
Published 12/19/2002 11:50 AM

NEW YORK, Dec. 19 (UPI) — Greece is blithely going ahead with the construction of a new $87 million Acropolis Museum in Athens centered on a huge exhibition hall for the display of the Parthenon marbles, most of which are owned by the British Museum and not likely to leave London at any time in the near future.

Not since the late actress Melina Mercouri was Greece’s famously nagging culture minister has the British Museum been under such pressure to surrender possession of the so-called Elgin Marbles, brought to England by British diplomat Lord Elgin to insure their safety during the Greek war of independence from the Ottoman Turks. The British Museum bought the collection of sculptures from Elgin in 1816.
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Co-operation between the British & Australian government is leading towards the proposed return of various Aboriginal artefacts involving human remains, currently held in the UK’s Museums. Museums are trying to block any changes to the law that would allow this, partly out of a fear that such artefact returns would then lead to them having to return items such as the Parthenon Sculptures.

From:
The Age (Melbourne)

Return of remains at risk
December 18 2002
By Peter Fray
Europe Correspondent
London

Britain’s long-running dispute with Greece over the return of the Elgin Marbles sculptures threatens to stall Australian efforts to repatriate thousands of Aboriginal remains from leading British museums.

Members of an independent British working group, due to report on the export of human remains, say they have recently been warned against recommending law reforms that might indirectly assist the Greeks.
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Italy has made the brave move, of being the first country to commit to returning a fragment from the Parthenon Sculptures. It might be a small fragment, but it is a start, and will increase the pressure on other institutions to follow suit.

From:
Guardian

Italian loan puts marbles pressure on British Museum
Fiachra Gibbons, arts correspondent
Friday December 13, 2002
The Guardian

Italy yesterday put further pressure on the British Museum to hand back the Elgin Marbles to Greece by returning a fragment of the contested 4th century BC frieze they themselves looted.

The choice of a piece of a statue of Peitho, the goddess of persuasion and seduction, on a long-term loan back to Athens could not have been more diplomatically powerful. A similar deal offered to Britain last month in an attempt to get the marbles back in time for the 2004 Olympics was rebuffed.
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Greek Culture Minster, Evangelos Venizelos, has issued a statement, clarifying what Greece is & isn’t asking to be returned – and that the requests against the British Museum only include the sculptures from the Parthenon, despite assertions from the museums that this would be the tip of the iceberg, leading to more artefacts returning afterwards.

From:
New York Times

December 13, 2002
Greece Affirms Limits to Elgin Marbles Claim
By CELESTINE BOHLEN

Greece’s case for the return of the so-called Elgin Marbles — fragments of the Parthenon frieze now housed in the British Museum — has nothing to do with claims for the repatriation of other cultural assets, Evangelos Venizelos, the Greek culture minister, said yesterday.

He was responding to a recent statement signed by 18 museum directors representing most of the major museums of the United States and Europe (except those in Britain and most of those in Italy). The statement affirmed the museums’ right to hold on to artworks that have long been in their collections.
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Various major museums from around the world have issued a document declaring the importance of the Universal Museum. It is thought that part of their aim behind this, is in an attempt to prevent having to return artefacts from their collections (with dubious provenance) to their original owners. This is of particular concern to many Australian Aboriginal groups, who were having a certain level of success in working towards a commitment for the return of artefacts involving human remains.

From:
The Age (Melbourne)

Museums get tough on ‘trophy’ returns
December 11 2002
By Peter Fray,
Europe Correspondent,
London

A group of leading European and US museums have issued a declaration opposing the wholesale repatriation of cultural artefacts seized during imperial rule or by means now considered unethical.

They say the universal role played by collections of archaeological, artistic and ethnic objects in promoting culture outweighs the desire by individual countries or racial groups for their return.
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More coverage of the declaration on the importance of the Universal Museum – issued without the name of the British Museum included on it, but thought by many to have been masterminded by them. Many have been quick to notice the relevance of this declaration in trying to shore up the British Museums defences for their retention of the Elgin Marbles, against the powerful argument presented by the construction of the New Acropolis Museum in Athens.

From:
News Observer

Wednesday, December 11, 2002 3:26PM EST
World galleries back British Museum in dispute with Greece
By ROBERT BARR, ASSOCIATED PRESS

LONDON (AP) – Several of the world’s leading museums defended the British Museum’s right to keep ancient statues taken from the Parthenon 200 years ago, despite Greek demands for their return.

A letter signed by the directors of 18 museums, including the Louvre and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, said works acquired decades ago have become essential to the museums that house them. “Objects acquired in earlier times must be viewed in the light of different sensitivities and values, reflective of that earlier era,” the statement said.
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A Belgian newspaper appears to have re-printed the story about the real origins of the Elgin Marbles from Artnose, without realising that the whole story was originally written as a satirical spoof.

From:
Guardian

How the Belgians lost their marbles
Fiachra Gibbon, arts correspondent
Saturday December 7, 2002

It looked like the archaeological scoop of the year. The Elgin Marbles were not Greek after all, but the work of a wandering stonemason from Devon called Phil Davies who changed his name to Pheidias to ingratiate himself with his ancient Athenian patrons.

And it got better. The British Museum, sick of a century of Greek whingeing about its refusal to return to sculptures to the Acropolis, was now demanding the repatriation of the entire Parthenon to Britain where it would be rebuilt as a part of a “shopping centre and multiplex cinema” in the West Midlands.
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Ellis Tinios, argues that the sculptures from the Parthenon that remain in Athens are not as well preserved as those in London, but this seems to miss a lot of key points.

Surely, if he was free to take whichever pieces he wanted to, Elgin would have taken the best ones available & not the worst ones.

Secondly, if Elgin’s removal of the sculptures did have an incidental effect of preservation was just that – entirely incidental. Elgin never originally intended the sculptures for anything other than ornamenting his own house. Claims about damage to them in Athens appeared only when the removal process was already very well advanced.

Finally – most of the factors such as acid rain & other pollution are things that Elgin could hardly have anticipated – they are post-rationalised arguments based on looking back with hindsight – which should in no way justify the original actions.

From:
Guardian

The fate of the Parthenon sculptures in Athens
This is the history of what happened to the sculptures on the Parthenon from early Christian times to the 21st century and the damage to those remaining after Lord Elgin bought the majority of them
By Ellis Tinios

Advocates of the “restitution” of the Elgin Marbles do their best to ignore, belittle or dismiss the fact that the sculptures removed by Lord Elgin’s agents from the Parthenon were spared substantial further damage. Instead, the more intemperate of them suggest that Elgin’s actions represent perhaps the worst assault ever perpetrated upon the building.

The history of the degradation and destruction of the architectural sculpture on the Parthenon spans 1,600 years, from the fifth century to the closing decades of the 20th century. In what follows I will seek to place Elgin’s actions in the context of that history before turning to what I regard the central issue in the “Marbles” debate.
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There are many copies of the Parthenon Sculptures about – some are better reproductions than others, depending on whether they were a first or later generation cast. But there is only one original set, which Greece hopes to be able to house in the New Acropolis Museum once it opens.

From:
Norwich Bulletin

Sunday, November 17, 2002
Slater’s Parthenon replicas impress — despite Greek snub
By DAVID PENCEK
Norwich Bulletin

NORWICH — Copies? We don’t want your copies. We have plenty of copies. We want the originals.

That’s how a spokesman from the U.S. Greek Embassy responded when asked by a reporter if Greece had any interest in borrowing the Slater Museum’s plaster-cast replicas of the disputed Parthenon marbles.

Greece wants the original marbles returned in time for the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. The originals have been housed in the British Museum in London since it acquired them from Lord Elgin in 1811.
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Greece is building a new museum specifically to house all the surviving Parthenon sculptures in one place. Unless the British Museum changes their mind though, it looks as though it will open without this main exhibit in place.

From:
Guardian

No, you can’t play with our marbles
A new museum in Athens looks doomed, not least because it won’t have its major exhibits
Deyan Sudjic
Sunday November 17, 2002
The Observer

Never mind for a moment what Bernard Tschumi’s new Acropolis Museum might look like. From the Greek government’s point of view, he is the ideal architect to design a home for the Parthenon marbles in the unlikely event that Neil McGregor ever changes his mind and lets them out of the British Museum.

Not only is Tschumi not Greek, and can therefore be presumed to be neutral in the struggle for the marbles, but he is also fashionable. So his appointment can be presented as a confident, open- minded gesture of cultural maturity rather than the more predictable selection of a favoured local son. With an international reputation based on his years teaching at the Architectural Association in London and now as the Dean at Columbia University in New York, the Swiss-born Tschumi’s credentials are impeccable.
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The Elgin Marbles were carved by a Welsh sculpture called Phil Davies – allegedly…

The problem is that the story sounds more plausible that some of the other mis-information that is used to justify the continued retention of these sculptures in the British Museum.

From:
Artnose

Elgin Marbles were made by Englishman, claims Oxford don
By Percy Flarge
Artnose Cultural Heritage correspondent

THE ELGIN MARBLES were made by an English sculptor and are therefore definitively English and should stay in Britain, according to new research by the renowned Oxford archaeologist Dr Rex Tooms.

Dr Tooms’s research has uncovered fresh evidence that Pheidias, the Greek sculptor of the Parthenon Marbles (one shown above left) was not in fact Greek at all, but an itinerant worker of British extraction named Philip Davies who settled in Athens around 453 and who changed his name to Pheidias in order to insinuate himself into Athenian social and artistic circles.
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