More coverage & analysis of the continuing delays to the British Museum’s planned return of the Cyrus Cylinder to Iran.

From:
Financial Times

Storm in a cylinder
Published: January 22 2010 22:44 | Last updated: January 22 2010 22:44

The row over the British Museum’s delay in honouring its agreement to lend a precious artefact to Iran is no more than a storm in a cylinder – but no less instructive for being confected.

The museum has held up the loan to Iran’s National Museum of the Cyrus Cylinder, a cuneiform document inscribed in clay in 539BC by Cyrus the Great, King of Persia, to commemorate his conquest of Babylon. The reason for the delay is the discovery of two fragments from the cylinder that could greatly elucidate its purpose.
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More coverage of the discovery of new fragments of the Cyrus Cylinder & the delays that it is causing to the proposed loan of the artefact to Iran.

From:
The Art Newspaper

Major discovery delays Cyrus Cylinder loan to Iran
British Museum says the finding of related texts is “very significant” but Iranian cultural heritage head threatening to cut cultural ties to the UK
By Martin Bailey | Published online 20 Jan 10

The British Museum’s (BM) loan of the Cyrus Cylinder to Iran has been delayed, because of a major discovery in London. Part of Cyrus the Great’s text has been found on two fragments of inscribed clay tablets.

The first fragment was identified on 31 December by Wilfred Lambert, a retired professor from Birmingham University, who was going through some of the 130,000 tablets at the museum. Although it had been seen by earlier scholars, no one had linked the text to the Cyrus Cylinder.
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Despite many invites being sent to the British Museum & key figures in the British Establishment, it appears that there wil be few official representatives from the UK present at the official opening of the New Acropolis Museum. One would think that if they had such a strong position as they claim, then they would be more than happy to attend such an event rather than shying away from it.

From:
Financial Times

UK absent from Greece’s Acropolis celebration
By Kerin Hope in Athens
Published: June 20 2009 03:00 | Last updated: June 20 2009 03:00

It will be Greece’s smartest party of the summer – a moonlit dinner for 300 international guests on the terrace of the new Acropolis museum.

The list for tonight’s bash includes as many political and cultural luminaries as Antonis Samaras, the culture minister, could muster as Greece raises the stakes in its long-running campaign for the return of the Elgin marbles by the UK.
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A selection of photo gallery articles that showcase the New Acropolis Museum can be seen at the following websites.

From:
Financial Times

Slideshow: The new Acropolis Museum
Published: June 19 2009 15:12 | Last updated: June 19 2009 15:12

The new Acropolis Museum in Athens, containing the world’s finest collection of ancient Greek sculpture, opens to the public on Monday.

The Greek government hopes its opening will help revive an international campaign to bring back the Elgin marbles – sculptures from the Acropolis temples displayed in the British Museum in London.
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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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This article looks at the effects that the New Acropolis Museum will have on the area surrounding it – & why some Athenians are pleased with it while others are not.

From:
Financial Times

Acropolis now
By Kerin Hope
Published: April 18 2009 01:10 | Last updated: April 18 2009 01:10

Lights blaze after dark in the glass-and-concrete galleries of the new museum at the foot of the Acropolis hill as curators work overtime to prepare for its long-awaited opening on June 20.

Architect Bernard Tschumi’s pared-down rectangular block, with a top-floor space for the Parthenon frieze that mirrors the dimensions and orientation of the famous classical temple, is already an Athens landmark. About 1m tourists are expected to pass through its doors every year but the Swiss-born Tschumi and his Greek associate Michael Photiadis are keen for the new Acropolis museum to attract local residents too. Along with an unparalleled collection of ancient sculpture, it offers cafés with a spectacular view, a bookshop, an auditorium and space for temporary exhibitions.
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This piece on the Chinese Bronzes identifies Cai Mingchao as China’s Melina Mercouri – someone who will spearhead the fight to reunify cultural property with its homeland. Events such as the ones involving the bronzes often re-expose fault lines in international relations that people had thought were long forgotten, by highlighting the inequities of the past.

From:
Financial Times

Beijing bronzes expose faultline with west
By Geoff Dyer in Beijing
Published: March 6 2009 19:15 | Last updated: March 6 2009 19:15

Mention the Earls of Elgin and one notorious holder of the title springs to mind – the one-time British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire (and 7th earl) who, in 1801, removed the marble sculptures from the Parthenon that are now housed in the British Museum.

His son is less well-known, but he was also responsible for what many view as an infamous act of cultural vandalism. In the aftermath of the second opium war in 1860, it was the 8th Earl of Elgin who ordered French, British and Punjabi soldiers to destroy the Old Summer Palace in Beijing.
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The Financial Times has published various letters in response to their earlier article on what is required for the Parthenon Marbles to be returned.

From:
Financial Times

The real barrier to a compromise over Marbles
Published: December 6 2008 02:00 | Last updated: December 6 2008 02:00

From Prof John Kapranos Huntley.

Sir, It is refreshing to read a balanced commentary on the future of the Parthenon Marbles by someone who so clearly understands the conflicting feelings and aspirations that surround it (Peter Aspden, “A manifesto for the Marbles”, Life & Arts , November 29/30). A putative voice for reason and conciliation has been raised. What might drown it out is the underlying conflict over a matter the FT and its readership would hopefully go a long way to defend: property rights.

The Parthenon Marbles are not simply artefacts; they are fixtures attached to buildings on the Parthenon for more than 2,300 years until they were forcibly removed. They are not independent pieces of statuary or pottery to be crated around the “cultural” museums of the world.
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The New Acropolis Museum in Athens once opened may provide the strongest argument yet for the return of the Parthenon Marbles.

From:
Financial Times

A manifesto for the Parthenon Marbles
By Peter Aspden
Published: November 29 2008 00:30 | Last updated: November 29 2008 00:30

It stands like a giant modernist spaceship that has belly-flopped by curious accident opposite one of the most important cultural sites on the planet. Polemics and controversy have been hard-wired into its being. It has taken decades in the planning, years in the realisation, and an extra few months beyond its intended inauguration in the fine-tuning. But, finally, the new Acropolis Museum (left), fresh home to the extraordinary artistic legacy of ancient Athens, is ready to open its doors to the public.

Next spring, visitors will set foot inside Swiss architect Bernard Tschumi’s glass-and-concrete edifice, all sharp edges and skewed angles, and address for themselves one of the the most intractable cultural disputes of modern times. When they travel to the museum’s top floor, they will see marble panels from the famous frieze that used to encircle the Parthenon, the symbol of Athenian democracy that stands like a staid, elderly relative, looking wearily across at the upstart building from its incomparable vantage point on top of the Acropolis a few hundred metres away.
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A review of James Cuno’s new book in the Financial Times gives the impression that the provenance of all artefacts is somewhat vague. This seems to be a grossly inaccurate statement, which ignores the vast numbers of artefacts with clearly traceable provenance, whilst attempting to legitimise the position of museums & institutions of the west who hold onto artefacts whose provenance is many levels below murky.

David Gill expands on this on his blog.

Who Owns Antiquity? Museums and the Battle over Our Ancient Heritage: Museums and the Battle Over Our Ancient Heritage
Author: James Cuno
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691137129

From:
Financial Times

Who Owns Antiquity?
Review by Christian Tyler
Published: August 4 2008 08:08 | Last updated: August 4 2008 08:08
Who Owns Antiquity? Museums and the Battle over our Ancient Heritage
By James Cuno
Princeton University Press £14.95, 265 pages
FT Bookshop price: £11.95

The provenance of antiquities has always been murky. In the past, it didn’t stop museums from acquiring great collections. These days, it is such a political issue that curators have to work hard to defend what their museums already hold, let alone add to their collections.

Many governments are nationalising the antiquities in their countries – by criminalising private possession, banning exports and demanding the restitution of objects which have been held abroad for years.
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The chances of the Lindisfarne Gospels returning to North East England may be increasing. Could the Lewis Chessmen be the next intra-national restitution case to see progress?

From:
Financial Times

Durham hopes to regain Gospels
By Chris Tighe
Published: June 28 2008 03:00 | Last updated: June 28 2008 03:00

Almost five centuries since Henry VIII’s thugs looted Durham Cathedral and stole the Lindisfarne Gospels, hopes are rising that this stunning work of art may return to its spiritual home.

A monument to the Golden Age of the ancient Kingdom of Northumbria, the 1,300-year-old manuscript created on Holy Island, off the Northumberland coast, has acquired something of the mystique of a holy relic.
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