Whose Culture The Promise Of Museums And The Debate Over Antiquities

Author : James Cuno
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 1400833043
Total Pages : 232 pages
Book Rating : 4.47/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Whose Culture? written by James Cuno and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2012-05-23 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The international controversy over who "owns" antiquities has pitted museums against archaeologists and source countries where ancient artifacts are found. In his book Who Owns Antiquity?, James Cuno argued that antiquities are the cultural property of humankind, not of the countries that lay exclusive claim to them. Now in Whose Culture?, Cuno assembles preeminent museum directors, curators, and scholars to explain for themselves what's at stake in this struggle--and why the museums' critics couldn't be more wrong. Source countries and archaeologists favor tough cultural property laws restricting the export of antiquities, have fought for the return of artifacts from museums worldwide, and claim the acquisition of undocumented antiquities encourages looting of archaeological sites. In Whose Culture?, leading figures from universities and museums in the United States and Britain argue that modern nation-states have at best a dubious connection with the ancient cultures they claim to represent, and that archaeology has been misused by nationalistic identity politics. They explain why exhibition is essential to responsible acquisitions, why our shared art heritage trumps nationalist agendas, why restrictive cultural property laws put antiquities at risk from unstable governments--and more. Defending the principles of art as the legacy of all humankind and museums as instruments of inquiry and tolerance, Whose Culture? brings reasoned argument to an issue that for too long has been distorted by politics and emotionalism. In addition to the editor, the contributors are Kwame Anthony Appiah, Sir John Boardman, Michael F. Brown, Derek Gillman, Neil MacGregor, John Henry Merryman, Philippe de Montebello, David I. Owen, and James C. Y. Watt.

Author : James Cuno
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226126773
Total Pages : 166 pages
Book Rating : 4.77/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Museums Matter written by James Cuno and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2011 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Powerful, passionate, and to the point, this book is the product of a lifetime of working in and thinking about museums; no museumgoer should miss it. The book is an impassioned argument for what Cuno calls the 'cosmopolitan aspirations' encyclopedic museums.

Author : James Cuno
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 1400839246
Total Pages : 285 pages
Book Rating : 4.47/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Who Owns Antiquity? written by James Cuno and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2010-10-18 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether antiquities should be returned to the countries where they were found is one of the most urgent and controversial issues in the art world today, and it has pitted museums, private collectors, and dealers against source countries, archaeologists, and academics. Maintaining that the acquisition of undocumented antiquities by museums encourages the looting of archaeological sites, countries such as Italy, Greece, Egypt, Turkey, and China have claimed ancient artifacts as state property, called for their return from museums around the world, and passed laws against their future export. But in Who Owns Antiquity?, one of the world's leading museum directors vigorously challenges this nationalistic position, arguing that it is damaging and often disingenuous. "Antiquities," James Cuno argues, "are the cultural property of all humankind," "evidence of the world's ancient past and not that of a particular modern nation. They comprise antiquity, and antiquity knows no borders." Cuno argues that nationalistic retention and reclamation policies impede common access to this common heritage and encourage a dubious and dangerous politicization of antiquities--and of culture itself. Antiquities need to be protected from looting but also from nationalistic identity politics. To do this, Cuno calls for measures to broaden rather than restrict international access to antiquities. He advocates restoration of the system under which source countries would share newly discovered artifacts in exchange for archaeological help, and he argues that museums should again be allowed reasonable ways to acquire undocumented antiquities. Cuno explains how partage broadened access to our ancient heritage and helped create national museums in Cairo, Baghdad, and Kabul. The first extended defense of the side of museums in the struggle over antiquities, Who Owns Antiquity? is sure to be as important as it is controversial. Some images inside the book are unavailable due to digital copyright restrictions.

Author : Derek Gillman
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 0521192552
Total Pages : 217 pages
Book Rating : 4.52/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Idea of Cultural Heritage written by Derek Gillman and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-04-12 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reviews the competing claims that works of art belong either to a particular people and place, or to humankind.

Author : John M. MacKenzie
Publisher : Manchester University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780719083679
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.72/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Museums and Empire written by John M. MacKenzie and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 2010-11-15 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Museums and Empire is the first book to examine the origins and development of museums in six major regions of the British Empire in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It analyzes museum histories in thirteen major centers in Canada, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, India, and South-East Asia, setting them into the economic and social contexts of the cities and colonies in which they were located. Written in a lively and informative style, it also touches upon the history of many other museums in Britain and other territories of the Empire. A number of key themes emerge from its pages; the development of elites within colonial towns and cities; the emergence of the full range of cultural institutions associated with this; and the reception and modification of the key scientific ideas of the age. It will be essential reading for students and academics concerned with museum studies and imperial history and to a wider public devoted to the cause of museums and heritage

Author : American Council for Cultural Policy
Publisher : Rutgers University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780813536873
Total Pages : 402 pages
Book Rating : 4.71/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Who Owns the Past? written by American Council for Cultural Policy and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Public and private institutions in the United States have long been home to a variety of art works, antiquities, and ethnological materials. For years, these collections have been seen as important archives that allow present and future generations to enjoy, appreciate, and value the art of all cultures. The past decade, however, has seen major changes in law and public policy and an active, ongoing debate over legal and ethical issues affecting the ownership of art and other cultural property. Contributors to Who Owns the Past? include legal scholars, museum professionals, anthropologists, archaeologists, and collectors. In clear, nontechnical language, they provide a comprehensive overview of the development of cultural property law and practices, as well as recent case law affecting the ability of museums and private collectors to own art from other countries. Topics covered include rights to property, ethical ownership, the public responsibilities of museums, threats to art from war, pillage, and development, and international cooperation to preserve collections in the developing world. Engaging all perspectives on this debate, Who Owns the Past? challenges all who care about the arts to work together toward policies that consider traditional American interests in securing cultural resources and respect international concerns over loss of heritage.

Author : Jason Felch
Publisher : HMH
ISBN 13 : 0547538022
Total Pages : 397 pages
Book Rating : 4.20/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Chasing Aphrodite written by Jason Felch and published by HMH. This book was released on 2011-05-24 with total page 397 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A “thrilling, well-researched” account of years of scandal at the prestigious Getty Museum (Ulrich Boser, author of The Gardner Heist). In recent years, several of America’s leading art museums have voluntarily given up their finest pieces of classical art to the governments of Italy and Greece. Why would they be moved to such unheard-of generosity? The answer lies at the Getty, one of the world’s richest and most troubled museums, and scandalous revelations that it had been buying looted antiquities for decades. Drawing on a trove of confidential museum records and candid interviews, these two journalists give us a fly-on-the-wall account of the inner workings of a world-class museum, and tell a story of outlandish characters and bad behavior that could come straight from the pages of a thriller. “In an authoritative account, two reporters who led a Los Angeles Times investigation reveal the details of the Getty Museum’s illicit purchases, from smugglers and fences, of looted Greek and Roman antiquities. . . . The authors offer an excellent recap of the museum’s misdeeds, brimming with tasty details of the scandal that motivated several of America’s leading art museums to voluntarily return to Italy and Greece some 100 classical antiquities worth more than half a billion dollars.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “An astonishing and penetrating look into a veiled world where beauty and art are in constant competition with greed and hypocrisy. This engaging book will cast a fresh light on many of those gleaming objects you see in art museums.” —Jonathan Harr, author of The Lost Painting

Author : Lucas Lixinski
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 0198843305
Total Pages : 321 pages
Book Rating : 4.06/5 ( download)

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Download or read book International Heritage Law for Communities written by Lucas Lixinski and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2019-06-06 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book critically engages the shortcomings of the field of international heritage law, seen through the lenses of the five major UNESCO treaties for the safeguarding of different types of heritage. It argues that these five treaties have effectively prevented local communities, who bear the brunt of the costs associated with international heritage protection, from having a say in how their heritage is managed. The exclusion of local communities often alienates them not only from international decision-making processes but also from their cultural heritage itself, ultimately meaning that systems put in place for the protection of cultural heritage contribute to its disappearance in the long term. International Heritage Law for Communities adds to existing literature by looking at these UNESCO treaties not as isolated regimes, but rather as belonging to a discursive continuum on cultural heritage. In doing so, the book focuses on themes that cut across the relevant UNESCO regimes like the use of expert rule in international heritage law, economics, the relationship between heritage and the environment, among others, rather than the regimes themselves. It uses this mechanism to highlight the blind spots and unintended consequences of UNESCO treaties and how choices made in their drafting have continuing and potentially negative impacts on how we think about and safeguard heritage.

Author : Ann C. Gunter
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 1118301250
Total Pages : 704 pages
Book Rating : 4.58/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Companion to Ancient Near Eastern Art written by Ann C. Gunter and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2018-11-20 with total page 704 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides a broad view of the history and current state of scholarship on the art of the ancient Near East This book covers the aesthetic traditions of Mesopotamia, Iran, Anatolia, and the Levant, from Neolithic times to the end of the Achaemenid Persian Empire around 330 BCE. It describes and examines the field from a variety of critical perspectives: across approaches and interpretive frameworks, key explanatory concepts, materials and selected media and formats, and zones of interaction. This important work also addresses both traditional and emerging categories of material, intellectual perspectives, and research priorities. The book covers geography and chronology, context and setting, medium and scale, while acknowledging the diversity of regional and cultural traditions and the uneven survival of evidence. Part One of the book considers the methodologies and approaches that the field has drawn on and refined. Part Two addresses terms and concepts critical to understanding the subjects and formal characteristics of the Near Eastern material record, including the intellectual frameworks within which monuments have been approached and interpreted. Part Three surveys the field’s most distinctive and characteristic genres, with special reference to Mesopotamian art and architecture. Part Four considers involvement with artistic traditions across a broader reach, examining connections with Egypt, the Aegean, and the Mediterranean. And finally, Part Five addresses intersections with the closely allied discipline of archaeology and the institutional stewardship of cultural heritage in the modern Middle East. Told from multiple perspectives, A Companion to Ancient Near Eastern Art is an enlightening, must-have book for advanced undergraduate and graduate students of ancient Near East art and Near East history as well as those interested in history and art history.

Author : Maxwell Lincoln Anderson
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190614935
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.35/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Antiquities written by Maxwell Lincoln Anderson and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The destruction of ancient monuments and artworks by the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria has shocked observers worldwide. Yet iconoclastic erasures of the past date back at least to the mid-1300s BCE, during the Amarna Period of ancient Egypt's 18th dynasty. Far more damage to the past has been inflicted by natural disasters, looters, and public works. Art historian Maxwell Anderson's Antiquities: What Everyone Needs to Know(R) analyzes continuing threats to our heritage, and offers a balanced account of treaties and laws governing the circulation of objects; the history of collecting antiquities; how forgeries are made and detected; how authentic works are documented, stored, dispersed, and displayed; the politics of sending antiquities back to their countries of origin; and the outlook for an expanded legal market. Anderson provides a summary of challenges ahead, including the future of underwater archaeology, the use of drones, remote sensing, and how invisible markings on antiquities will allow them to be traced. Written in question-and-answer format, the book equips readers with a nuanced understanding of the legal, practical, and moral choices that face us all when confronting antiquities in a museum gallery, shop window, or for sale on the Internet.