This news is rather late, as the cuts to the opening budget were covered by some news sources many months ago. It seems only right that during a global economic downturn when governments have to make cutbacks across the board that such events have to be scaled back to a more manageable cost. In the end though, the opening event will come & go – it is the museum itself that will present the persuasive argument for years to come.

From:
Financial Times

Acropolis museum budget cut
By Kerin Hope in Athens
Published: May 23 2009 03:00 | Last updated: May 23 2009 03:00

Greece has cut the €6m budget for the festivities to mark the June 20 opening of the new Acropolis museum by more than half as recession looms over its economy.

But a ticket to see the 2,500-year-old sculptures from the Parthenon and other temples on the Acropolis hill will cost just €1 this year – the same price as a journey on the subsidised Athens metro. By comparison a ticket for Paris’s Louvre costs €9, or €14 ($19.56, £12.34) to include temporary exhibitions, and New York’s Metropolitan Museum charges $20 (€14.20, £12.60).
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The admission charges for the New Acropolis Museum have now been published & at one euro for the first six months, it is likely to be packed with visitors. The British Museum often makes statements about how the Parthenon Marbles there can be seen free of charge, but neglects to admit that they do charge for many other exhibits there. In the end, if an admission charge is reasonable (which even the eventual five Euro charge will be), then surely the overall visitor experience is more important than the absolute bottom line costs, especially considering that many people will have spent far large amounts to get to the museums in the first place.

From:
Reuters

Greece aims to bring back Parthenon relics from Britain
Wed May 20, 2009 6:13pm BST

ATHENS (Reuters) – Greece will open a new Acropolis Museum in June, its culture minister said Wednesday, with the aim of bringing back historical monuments currently exhibited in the British Museum in London.

Greece has campaigned for decades to retrieve the Parthenon sculptures from the British Museum and said they were an integral part of one of the world’s most important monuments, but the British Museum has refused to return the treasures.
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More coverage of the recent return of various looted artefacts from a number of sources to Greece. As with any restitution act involving Greece, parallels are immediately drawn with the case of the Parthenon Marbles.

From:
Associated Press

Fifth century BC objects returned to Greece
1 day ago

ATHENS (AFP) — Greece on Tuesday reclaimed scores of ancient objects dating to the fifth century BC that Belgian, British and German authorities returned, the culture ministry said.

The list includes over 100 clay fragments and coins held by the Belgian Archaeological School, 70 ancient funerary offerings seized by German customs officials in Nuremberg in 2007 and a marble decorative fragment from a Byzantine church donated by a British ceramist, the ministry said.
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Following a plea by Greece’s president, the Acropolis has now re-opened following strikes that have closed it for the last week.

From:
Athens News Agency

03/12/2009
Acropolis opens to public

Culture Ministry’s employees on Thursday cancelled their 24-hour strike and opened the archaelogical site of the Acropolis for visitors, in an act of good will after reassurances by Culture Minister Antonis Samaras for resolving the problem of paying contract staff working at the culture ministry through a bill to be tabled in Parliament within days.
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Greece’s president Karolos Papoulias has now called for an end to the strikes that are currently closing Athens’s Acropolis to visitors. Whilst there is sympathy for the strikers, their actions have the potential to cause major damage to the Greece’s tourist trade.

From:
Associated Press

Greece: Strikers close Acropolis for back pay
1 day ago

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Striking Culture Ministry employees closed the Acropolis to visitors Wednesday for the fifth time in two weeks, turning hundreds of tourists away from the ancient site.

The protesters are mostly contract workers demanding permanent jobs and back pay. Hundreds of visitors stood outside the entrance as strikers handed out fliers detailing their demands.
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Works on the Acropolis Restoration will include the installation of new sensors to measure the effects of earthquakes on the monuments.

From:
Associated Press

Scientists to measure quake effect on Acropolis
By ELENA BECATOROS – 58 minutes ago

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — For thousands of years the Acropolis has withstood earthquakes, weathered storms and endured temperature extremes, from scorching summers to winter snow.

Now scientists are drawing on the latest technology to install a system that will record just how much nature is affecting the 2,500-year-old site. They hope their findings will help identify areas that could be vulnerable, allowing them to target restoration and maintenance.
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Following occasional hints in the preceding weeks from the Greek press & yesterday’s meeting of Greek & Italian presidents, the Palermo fragment from the Parthenon frieze has now been returned on loan to Athens.

This is not the first piece from the Parthenon sculptures to be returned, but follows on from the reunification of another smaller piece by Heidelberg University two years previously.

The Palermo fragment return has a long history to it & efforts have been ongoing to secure its loan despite previous attempts that failed. It was originally taken from Greece by Lord Elgin & found its way to Palermo as a gift, separated from the remaining Elgin Marbles in London.

The British Museum have tried in the past to argue that the Parthenon Sculptures are spread across many different locations & that their institution should not be specifically be targeted. The number of other institutions holding on to fragments of the sculptures is rapidly falling though, making the British Museum’s argument progressively weaker.

From:
Associated Press

Italy returns piece of Parthenon Marbles to Greece
By NICHOLAS PAPHITIS – 15 hours ago

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece has finally taken possession of a chunk of the Elgin Marbles, and now holds renewed hopes of regaining the rest.

Italian President Giorgio Napolitano on Tuesday presented Greek authorities with a small piece of sculpture from the Parthenon kept in a museum in Palermo, Sicily, for the past 200 years.
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Another success story, a few days after Greece secured the return of illegally acquired artefacts from a prominent US collector.

From:
Associated Press

Hungary to return looted antiquities to Greece
By NICHOLAS PAPHITIS – Sep 11, 2008

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Hungary has offered to return a collection of antiquities on display in a leading Budapest museum that were illegally exported from Greece, the Hungarian foreign minister said Thursday.

Kinga Goncz said Greek and Hungarian experts would meet to study the 22 pieces and discuss which would be repatriated.
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Peru seems to be joining the ranks of Italy & Egypt in their current aggressive approach to secure the return of looted artefacts (with relative success).

From:
Associated Press

Peru wants to know origin of shipwrecked treasure
By CHRISTINE ARMARIO – 13 hours ago
Aug 20, 2008

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Peru’s government wants to know if 17 tons of silver coins recovered from a shipwreck in the Atlantic Ocean last year were made there, complicating the legal quest to determine who rightfully owns the multimillion-dollar treasure.

Peru filed a claim Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Tampa to determine where the coins originated, entering the fray over the $500 million loot found on a sunken ship by Tampa-based Odyssey Marine Exploration. Odyssey has been fighting the Spanish government for ownership of the ship and its contents.
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A new book looks at the story of the Rosetta Stone as being the most important artefact from Egypt, as it was this which helped the modern world to begin the process of understanding much of the background behind ancient Egypt. If a piece is this important though, setting aside issues of ownership & acquisition, should it not be located in the context of the other stories that it helped to unlock? Its impact and significance could be understood far better for those visiting Egypt than those visiting London.

From:
Newsday

The artifact that explained the other Egyptian artifacts
By MARY FOSTER | Associated Press Writer
5:05 PM EDT, July 31, 2008

“Discovery at Rosetta” (W.W. Norton & Co. Inc. 288 pages. $22.95), by Jonathan Downs: It’s the most important Egyptian artifact ever discovered — the key to the tale of the astonishing ancient civilization and its many accomplishments.

Egypt has always intrigued. The civilization with its pyramids, monuments, burial practices, pharaohs and deities was a mystery for generations. People wondered at the marvels left behind, but could only guess at the meanings they held.
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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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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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