FARRIS — PRE-EMPTIVE CULTURAL TAKE OVER IN IRAQ?
Topic(s): Iraq | Comments Off on FARRIS — PRE-EMPTIVE CULTURAL TAKE OVER IN IRAQ?PRE-EMPTIVE CULTURAL TAKE OVER IN IRAQ?
THE BRITISH MUSEUM, UNESCO, AND IRAQS ARTIFACTS
FARRIS WAHBEH
ARTiFACTs 4/29/03
With the recent looting of the Iraqi Museum and the subsequent outrage that it invoked throughout the world, it is no wonder that cultural institutions are fiercely mobilising in every rescue effort immaginable.
On-line databases have been created in The Art Newspaper and another spearheaded by archeologists including McGuire Gibson from the University of Chicago.
The Pentagon, alongside the FBI and CIA, are keeping a somewhat vigilante eye out at Customs, which yielded a Fox engineer and several U.S. servicemen being caught red handed with Iraqi artifacts.
But the unwatched aid of British and American Museums is slowly starting to turn heads in cultural institutions.
In a web-newsletter circulated by the Nordic Association of Conservators, American and British cultural groups have alrady placed themselves in full control of the artistic patrimony of Iraq.
This comes after a meeting held on April 17th sponsored by UNESCO, in which it seemed that American and British groups had placed themselves in charge of cultural affairs and that none of the other nations would be involved on an equal footing.
Prior the the meeting, British and Americans had already established the structure and defined the roles that each country would oversee in Iraq. All efforts would go through them. According to the Nordic Association of Conservators, the UNESCO meeting was used to persuade other nations to finance and support the British and American maneuvres.
The British Museum has already established a prescence in Baghdad sending a delegation to Iraq including conservators and curators from their institution. According to The Guardian the coalition was financed by an anonymous private donor.
Although their humanitarion intentions of aid comes as no surprise, the British Museum also has a history of obtaining loot in colonized countries.
In October of 2002, the British Museum, alongside the Metropolitan, the Guggenheim, the Whitney, the Prado, and the Hermitage, signed the ?Declaration on the Importance and Value of the Universal Museum.? The ratified declaration acknowledges that artifacts that were once looted during colonized times, or artifacts acquired through illegal means, must remain in their collections.
The ?Declaration? stressed that objects acquired through such very means ?have become part of the museums that have cared for them, and by extension part of the heritage of the nations that house them.? The ?Declaration? was issued after Greece put forth a claim to repatriate statues known as the Elgin Marbles, named after Lord Elgin who removed the objects off the Parthenon while Greece was under British rule in the late 19th century. The British Museum has declined to return the statues.
The ?Declaration? has been critisized since its ratification. The UK Museums Association called the ?Declaration? a ?George Bush approach to international relations… It is a very crude statement that doesn’t give credit to the subtlety of thought that many museums give this issue.?
The reconstruction of Iraqi museums and archives has been handed over to a British general overseeing six British experts. According to the Nordic Association of Conservators no one has asked the Iraqis to join in the reconstruction efforts. Following the UNESCO meeting in Paris, representatives from Denmark decided to not support the efforts of the British and Americans.
It remains to be seen what will in effect happen to the cultural heritage of Iraq and if any other private donors or museums will aid in its reconstruction or possible looting.
Currently, visas are only granted exclusively to US and British experts giving no possibility of outside nations to witness the reconstruction efforts. Furthermore, the identity of the private donor backing the British Museum in its efforts of reconstructing Iraqi cultural heritage raises questions of possible under the table acquisitions.
If their ?Declaration of the Universal Museum? is to be taken seriously, will calls for repatriation on behalf of the Iraqi people be denied by the issuance of such a ?Declaration? as is the case with Greece? Or will the artifacts find their way to the collection of the British Museum and instead become the possession of that very institution? If history is to be our judge the outcome of Iraqs cultural patrimony will inevitably be outside their jurisdiction.
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