Ethics and antiquities

Turkey is conducting a concerted campaign to reclaim antiquities that have found their way into European and American museums over the centuries.

CLICK HERE TO READ A RECENT ARTICLE FROM THE ECONOMIST looking at the ethics and the politics behind this "culture war"

The acquisition of African antiquities

In this article from Project Sydicate, Juliet Torome, a writer and documentary film maker, looks at the dubious provenance of many of the African cultural and historical artifacts that have been removed from their original sites or owners and  found their way into museums or the hands of private collectors

Ethnology Museums and the issue of exhibiting human remains

In colonial times, human remains were routinely collected by archaeologists and anthropologists and displayed in ethnology museums - this article from the Deutsche Welle website examines this issue in conjunction with a new exhibition at Vienna's Ethnology Museum which explores the context and legacy of the work of Hans Liechtenecker in Namibia in 1931 and his "Archive of Dying Races" that displayed human remains and featured oral recordings.
The Deutsche Welle article also looks at cases involving Australian Aborigine and Naga remains that have come to be displayed in museums

More on the acquisition of "cultural assets" by museums

Report from Bloomberg news on the ceding of a collection of antiquities to Leipzig University's Egyptian Museum by the Jewish Claims Conference.
The sale of the artifacts by Egyptologist Georg Steindorff to the Museum in 1937 had been ruled earlier this year as being made under duress. Steindorff, who was of Jewish descent, escaped from Germany in 1939.

School of Museology to be established in Egypt: online article

Egypt's museums have been in the news following the looting that took place in major institutions and at archaeological sites during the country's recent political upheavals.

"The lack of trained museum personnel is indeed the overarching problem in Egypt's path towards the creation of a new effective museum system" says Ramadan Badri Hussein, supervisor of the office of the MSA's Minister for Archaeological Affairs.

As part of an ongoing programme of initiatives, a School of Museology is shortly to be established at the Casdagli Palace in Cairo.

Read more in Nevine El-Aref's report for the al-Ahram Weekly Online

Museums and ethics

The Smithsonian Institution in Washington is facing calls to cancel a planned exhibition of Chinese artifacts salvaged from a Tang-era shipwreck as they were recovered by a commercial treasure-hunter rather than by academic, archaeological methods.
Read more in this article from the online New York Times  

Antiquities : is it possible to "collect" them with a clear conscience?

Article from the Huffington Post on the legality of collecting "antiquities" and the problems faced by museums where items in their collection, or that they wish to acquire, are of dubious provenance

Medieval Islamic courtyard at New York's Met

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is reconstructing a medieval Maghrebi-Andalusian courtyard as the centre-piece of its extensively remodeled Islamic art galleries.
Read a report from the New York Times on the Met's multi-million dollar project

Museums and national identity

The New York Times reports on the construction of 3 new museums in Abu Dhabi  (branches of the Guggenheim and the Louvre as well as a museum of national history) and the museums of Islamic art, modern Arabic art and Qatari history currently under construction or recently opened in Qatar.
The article looks at the cultural and political context of this spate of museum-building in both countries.