The Cairo government unveiled on Dec. 15 four newly renovated halls of the famed Tutankhamun gallery in the Egyptian Museum as the facility undergoes a complete overhaul.Artifacts are seen on display at the Egyptian museum as people visit following the inauguration of the completed restoration works in four halls situated in the entrance of the east wing of the Tutankhamun gallery at the museum in Cairo on December 15, 2014 [Credit: AFP]
The gallery houses treasures that were found intact in 1922 along with the mummy of the 19-year-old boy king in the temple city of Luxor, and is a world famous tourist attraction.
Its renovation is part of a seven-year project to refurbish the entire Egyptian Museum overlooking Tahrir Square, and in turn revive downtown Cairo.
On Monday, Prime Minister Ibrahim Mahlab unveiled the newly renovated halls located at the eastern entrance of the Tutankhamun gallery.
The renovation of the museum has been aided by funds from the European Union and other international donors.
James Moran, who heads the EU delegation in Cairo, said the bloc supported the project in order to help to boost Egypt's tourism sector whose "revival... is fundamental for the economy".
The EU, he added, would offer 92,500 euros ($115,000) next year to help renovate the eastern wing of Tutankhamun gallery.
The Egyptian Museum houses the largest collection of pharaonic artefacts and has witnessed several alterations since it was first opened in 1902.
Four years of political turmoil since the ouster of veteran leader Hosni Mubarak has battered the country's economy amid falling tourist revenues and investments.
A painting hanging on the wall in an art gallery tells one story. What lies beneath its surface may tell quite another.After Raphael 1483 - 1520, probably before 1600. It is an oil on wood, 87 x 61.3 cm. (Wynn Ellis Bequest, 1876) [Credit: Copyright National Gallery, London]
Often in a Rembrandt, a Vermeer, a Leonardo, a Van Eyck, or any other great masterpiece of western art, the layers of paint are covered with varnish, sometimes several coats applied at different times over their history. The varnish was originally applied to protect the paint underneath and make the colors appear more vivid, but over the centuries it can degrade. Conservators carefully clean off the old varnish and replace it with new, but to do this safely it is useful to understand the materials and structure of the painting beneath the surface. Conservation scientists can glean this information by analyzing the hidden layers of paint and varnish.
Now, researchers from Nottingham Trent University's School of Science and Technology have partnered with the National Gallery in London to develop an instrument capable of non-invasively capturing subsurface details from artwork at a high resolution. Their setup, published in an Optics Express paper, will allow conservators and conservation scientists to more effectively peek beneath the surface of paintings and artifacts to learn not only how the artist built up the original composition, but also what coatings have been applied to it over the years.
Traditionally, analyzing the layers of a painting requires taking a very small physical sample -- usually around a quarter of a millimeter across -- to view under a microscope. The technique provides a cross-section of the painting's layers, which can be imaged at high resolution and analyzed to gain detailed information on the chemical composition of the paint, but does involve removing some original paint, even if only a very tiny amount. When studying valuable masterpieces, conservation scientists must therefore sample very selectively from already-damaged areas, often only taking a few minute samples from a large canvas.
More recently, researchers have begun to use non-invasive imaging techniques to study paintings and other historical artifacts. For example, Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) was originally developed for medical imaging but has also been applied to art conservation. Because it uses a beam of light to scan the intact painting without removing physical samples, OCT allows researchers to analyze the painting more extensively. However, the spatial resolution of commercially-available OCT setups is not high enough to fully map the fine layers of paint and varnish.
The Nottingham Trent University researchers gave OCT an upgrade. "We're trying to see how far we can go with non-invasive techniques. We wanted to reach the kind of resolution that conventional destructive techniques have reached," explained Haida Liang, who led the project.
In OCT, a beam of light is split: half is directed towards the sample, and the other half is sent to a reference mirror. The light scatters off both of these surfaces. By measuring the combined signal, which effectively compares the returned light from the sample versus the reference, the apparatus can determine how far into the sample the light penetrated. By repeating this procedure many times across an area, researchers can build up a cross-sectional map of the painting.
Liang and her colleagues used a broadband laser-like light source -- a concentrated beam of light containing a wide range of frequencies. The wider frequency range allows for more precise data collection, but such light sources were not commercially available until recently.
Along with a few other modifications, the addition of the broadband light source enabled the apparatus to scan the painting at a higher resolution. When tested on a late 16th-century copy of a Raphael painting, housed at the National Gallery in London, it performed as well as traditional invasive imaging techniques.
"We are able to not only match the resolution but also to see some of the layer structures with better contrast. That's because OCT is particularly sensitive to changes in refractive index," said Liang. In some places, the ultra-high resolution OCT setup identified varnish layers that were almost indistinguishable from each other under the microscope.
Eventually, the researchers plan to make their instrument available to other art institutions. It could also be useful for analyzing historical manuscripts, which cannot be physically sampled in the same way that paintings can.
In a parallel paper recently published in Optics Express, the researchers also improved the depth into the painting that their apparatus can scan. The two goals are somewhat at odds: using a longer wavelength light source could enhance the penetration depth, but shorter wavelength light (as used in their current setup) provides the best resolution.
"The next challenge is perhaps to be able to do that in one instrument, as well as to extract chemical information from different layers," said Liang.
Italy's leading tourist attractions including the Colosseum could soon be in foreign hands as the country seeks new directors from around the world to make its museums more profitable.The Colosseum draws 5.5 million visitors a year [Credit: NZ Herald]
In the biggest shake-up of arts and culture of modern times, Matteo Renzi, the Prime Minister, has announced that the Government is to run advertisements in the Economist on January 9 to recruit new administrators "because we want to have the best directors in the world".
The leadership changes are part of a dramatic shake-up of the arts spearheaded by Dario Franceschini, the Culture Minister, in an attempt to make the country's galleries, museums and historic sites more profit-driven. Italy boasts nearly 3000 cultural sites that attract 77 million visitors a year.
The Colosseum alone draws 5.5 million of those.
Among the other "super museums" Franceschini wants to develop are the Borghese Gallery and National Gallery of Modern Art in Rome and the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.
Under a government decree, Franceschini hopes to generate earnings of more than 2 billion ($3.16 billion) in 2017, with further growth in the years to come. Italy's museums, galleries and archeological sites generated only 380 million in revenue in 2013, according to La Repubblica newspaper, and cost 350 million to operate.
The minister's office declined to comment on the new plans. But, according to La Repubblica, Franceschini wants to model Italian museums on the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and add more restaurants, gift shops, guides and accessories that will attract more visitors and ultimately more profits.
He also wants to create 18 new regional offices with responsibility for the country's biggest artistic sites and grant more power to individual directors who run them. Italian media also said he was expected to appoint 12 new directors-general within his ministry who would manage specific sectors such as tourism, cinema and live theatre.
Franceschini has openly favoured other measures to increase tourism by "adding value" to the country's heritage and strongly supports corporate sponsorship.
He recently backed a move to bring live cultural events and concerts to ancient monuments such as the Colosseum because he said they needed to be "brought alive" for visitors from around the world.
In June, he launched a $50 million appeal to preserve the vast Domus Aurea palace built by Emperor Nero beside the Colosseum.
The Domus Aurea, loosely translated as the Golden House, is a sprawling complex of interconnecting dining halls, frescoed reception rooms and vaulted hallways on the hill opposite the ancient amphitheatre.
"The state has very limited resources unfortunately," said Franceschini at the time.
"This is an opportunity for a big company to sponsor an extraordinary project, which will capture the world's attention. It would be scandalous if no one comes forward."
Source: The New Zealand Herald [December 26, 2014]
Here's the latest set of images for this weeks new episode of "Doctor Who". The episode is titled, "The Doctor's Wife" and it's said that Suranne Jones's character is supposdly another possible Time Lord as The Doctor get's a distress call from a planet, which has a unknown Time Lord on it. I thought it would be The Master, but seems as though it may be either Jones's character or the TARDIS above. As it's shown that we get to see the previous TARDIS interior design in this episode. So maybe there's a lost TARDIS in this episode and the above pics is it. The whole wife in the title is unknown. Maybe Jones's character is the wife of The Doctor, but way back years ago, i.e. different time-line, different Doctor, who knows.
Salma Valgarma Hayek Jiménez-Pinaultor commonly calledSalma Hayek(Spanish pronunciation: [ˈsalma ˈxaʝek]; born September 2, 1966) is a Mexican actress, director and producer. Salma Hayek is one of the most prominent Mexican figures in Hollywood. Salma Hayek received a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her role as Frida Kahlo in the movie Frida. Hayek was born in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, Mexico, the daughter of Diana Jiménez Medina, an opera singer and talent scout, and Sami Hayek Dominguez, an oil company executive who once ran for mayor of Coatzacoalcos. Hayek's father is of Lebanese descent, while her mother is of Spanish descent. Her first given name, Salma, is Arabic for "safe". Raised in a wealthy, devoutly Roman Catholic family, she was sent to the Academy of the Sacred Heart in Grand Coteau, Louisiana, at the age of twelve. While there, she was diagnosed with dyslexia.She attended college in Mexico City, where she studied International Relations at the Universidad Iberoamericana.
The growing India-Australia bonhomie under PM Narendra Modi and his counterpart Tony Abbott is set to bring an end to an international art scandal which saw the surfacing of a Kushan Buddha statue in Canberra's National Gallery of Art (NGA) seven years ago.The Buddha statue of the Kushan period dating back to 2nd century BC is made of red sandstone and is from Mathura [Credit: Times of India]
Australia has informed Indian authorities that it will soon return the sculpture, dating back to second century BC, realizing that it had been stolen from an archaeological site in India. Abbott has on several occasions stated that improving relations with India was high on his priority list and one of the ways he has reached out to the Modi government is by returning stolen artifacts illegally taken out of India.
During his summit meet with Modi last year in September, Abbott returned statues of 11th century Shiva Nataraja and Ardhanariswara to India. According to a report in The Australian earlier this year, the artifact was purchased by billionaire philanthropist Ros Packer for NGA. After Indian authorities took up the issue with Australia, NGA launched a probe into how the statue was bought from a New York antiquities dealer and found that the dealer had tricked Australian authorities into believing that the red sandstone marvel had been purchased from a British collector in Hong Kong. The investigations revealed that the New York based dealer had travelled to India and acquired two Kushan Buddhas from a trafficker.
"The Department of Culture and the Archaeological Survey of India are working with the National Museum in Delhi to affect the handover. The Buddha statue of the Kushan period dating back to 2nd century BC is made of red sandstone and is from the Mathura region of Uttar Pradesh," said a senior government official.
Government sources here claimed there was a growing personal bonhomie between Modi and Abbott following their bilateral meetings last year. Modi last year became the first Indian PM to visit Australia after Rajiv Gandhi in 1985.
Author: Sachin Parashar | Source: Times of India [January 01, 2015]
New photos of a tower “The Shard”, a multi-functional building which will construct near to London Bridge are published. Design: Renzo Piano Building Workshop.
Works on building of a building in height of 306 metres which should be placed on a place of the wrong form near to station “London Bridge” have begun. The tower is a part of new building, London Bridge Quarter.
The design concept: some front glass blocks which are located under an inclination inside, but not incorporating completely. The image is inspired by ship masts by which Thames has once been filled.
On 72 floors offices, apartments, hotel, the trading areas and restaurants will be placed; in the top, survey part of a building (15 floors) the gallery will be placed.
The tower will be constructed on a place of a building of 1970 year of construction (Southwark Tower) which has been decided to dismantle for preparation of a place of building. The project is planned to finish by 2012th year.
Illegally exported ancient artefacts from Egypt which were discovered in Australia have been returned to the country's ambassador at a special ceremony in Canberra.A range of Egyptian artefacts which were illegally taken out of the country were returned to the ambassador [Credit: ABC News/Liz Foschia]
The items were seized by Australian Federal Police (AFP) officers and Federal Arts Department representatives from an auction house and private home in Sydney under laws designed to protect cultural objects.
Local authorities were tipped off by Interpol about the historic items including a Coptic textile fragment and large saucer lamp.
Macquarie University's Ancient Cultures Research Centre director Naguib Kanawati was one of several examiners who was asked to assess the cultural significance of the artefacts.
"While the provenance is unknown, the objects are all funerary in nature and would have been found in a cemetery or multiple cemeteries," he said.
They include a wooden hand belonging to an anthropoid coffin, small statuettes of a man and woman to serve the deceased in the afterlife, as well as a number of amulets.
A preliminary examination by Australian Egyptologists suggested the items date from the New Kingdom to Coptic periods and that some pieces may be over 3,000-years-old.
"As sites were used for burials by successive generations at different stratigraphic levels it is not unusual to find objects belonging to different periods at the same site," Professor Kanawati said.
Ancient Egyptian statue of a woman seized by police in Sydney after a tip off from Interpol [Credit: ABC News/Liz Foschia]
Federal Arts Minister George Brandis handed the artefacts back at a formal ceremony at the Egyptian Embassy in Yarralumla.
"This is a splendid and significant occasion because it is not often that one government has the opportunity to return to another government, artefacts that are precious not only to Egypt but significant to the history of civilisation itself," he said.
Egypt's ambassador Dr Hassan El-Laithy welcomed the return of the significant items.
"One of the pieces that the Honourable Minister handed back over was a piece that witnessed the Coptic history and Christianity in Egypt... something we are very proud of," he said.
"Egypt was not only privileged by having its old civilisation of the Pharaohs, but also having prophets Moses and Jesus living in Egypt."
Last year Prime Minister Tony Abbott returned a 900-year-old bronze statue of the god Shiva to India that was found to have been looted from a temple in Tamil Nadu.
The statue had been purchased by the National Gallery of Australia in 2008 from a New York art dealer who became embroiled in a stolen art trafficking scandal.
Cannes Film Festival, Salma Hayek made a flamboyant start to theCannes Film Festivalthis morning in an eye-catching dress. The Mexican actress was centre of attention in her wacky Gucci dress at a photocall to promote her new film Puss In Boots with co-star Antonio Banderas.
The 44-year-old was wearing a strapless burnt orange leather dress and matching floral bolero from the label's Autumn/Winter 2011 collection. Hayek is a big fan of the Italian label, but her decision to wear the unusual ensemble is also helping the family business as her billionaire husband François-Henri Pinault is the CEO of PPR - the company who owns Gucci.
Despite her tight-fitting dress and killer platform heels, Hayek managed to climb up on a pair of giant boots, which had been placed at the end of the pier on Carlton Beach. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1385906/Cannes-2011-Salma-Hayek-kicks-Film-Festival-wacky-Gucci-dress.html#ixzz1M3PFW02j
After lingering for more than a century in storage at the Archaeological Museum of Florence, an historical bronze horse head once owned by Lorenzo the Magnificent is undergoing restoration.The Classical Greek bronze sculpture, dated from 350 BC, was hidden for more that a century in Florence [Credit: ANSA]
The bronze sculpture, dated from 350 BC, once graced the halls of the Renaissance-era Palazzo Medici Riccardi in central Florence, and has been described as a masterpiece of Greek classical art.
But after it slipped from the grasp of the Medici clan it began to deteriorate as it found its way into the archaeological museum in 1881 where it is now said to be in serious need to restoration.
Researchers at Florence's National Research Council have been investigating problems of conservation and restoration related to such ancient materials as the alloys and gilding used in the bronze horse head.
The work is to be carried out inside the museum and can be viewed by the public during the museum's opening hours until March 8.
After that, it is scheduled to be included in an exhibition titled Power and Pathos at Florence's Palazzo Strozzi, along with other bronzes from the Hellenistic style.
Power and Pathos continues until June 21 before travelling to an exhibition in Los Angeles at the J. Paul Getty Museum and later in the year, at the National Gallery of Art in Washington.
Sonaisali Island Resort — magnificent hotel on lonely island. But it is not necessary to miss here — set of entertainments, the fine nature, and the main thing — the warm emerald sea — all it at your order.
Hotel from the Australian architects
The hotel has opened in 1992, it is constructed in traditions of Fijian architecture which so is harmoniously entered in a surrounding landscape. The resort consists of the general premises and a bungalow, shaded by magnificent tropical vegetation. At hotel restaurants it is offered to the menu, made under the influence of Asian, Indian and an European cuisine.
The freshest components are used only, vegetables and fruit are grown up there and then, on island. Also probably to arrange a romantic supper for two at a stellar light, under silent whisper of ocean waves.
Arrangement: at 4 o'clock flight from Sydney, at 3 o'clock flight from Oakland, at 10 o'clock flight from Los Angeles, in 3 minutes of driving from island Viti Levu. The hotel is designed by the Sydney architect, therefore, you to the full like the Australian aesthetics and up to the end will understand local mentality.
In hotel: 2 restaurants, a bar, a car rent and bicycles, shops, excursions, business centre, exchange, transfers from/in the airport, a laundry, a first-aid post, trading gallery from 3 large shops and several boutiques.
The Conference hall offers ample opportunities for carrying out of private meetings, trainings, conferences and seminars. The club for children works daily from 9 o'clock in the morning to 9 o'clock in the evening and offers the whole complex of entertainments for children from 4 till 12 years. In hotel there is a service of co-ordinators (wedding, on the organisation of meetings, on work with the Japanese clients, on work with groups).
Restaurants and bars: — Restaurant Sunset Terrace. — Restaurant The Plantation.
Sports and entertainments: tennis, riding, driving by boats, fishing, a water ski, a paintball, billiards-pool, the TV with the big screen in foyer, tables for Ping-Pong and board games, trips on jungle on motorcycles.
Residential architect Sydney — knows true sense in the Australian culture and is always ready to offer original architectural projects.
The British Museum is considering three further overseas loans from the Elgin Marbles – but a reluctance to entertain the sculptures’ return to Greece is set to provoke renewed anger in Athens.
Moves could reignite tensions over Greek art treasures [Credit: Independent]
Last year the British Museum allowed part of the Marbles to leave the country for the first time when it lent the headless statue of Ilissos, a Greek river god, to the State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg.
Greece, which is seeking to reclaim ownership of the 2,500-year-old sculptures removed from the Parthenon in Athens in the 19th century by Lord Elgin, described the Russia loan as “provocative”.
A current request from the British Museum for a key antiquity from the Museum of Cycladic Art in Athens for a forthcoming exhibition on classical sculpture has been delayed, in what is being seen as retaliatory move by the Greek authorities.
The work has been requested for the show, “Defining Beauty: the Body in ancient Greek Art”, which opens in March.
The delay is ascribed to “tensions” with the Greek government, despite friendly curatorial relations between the two institutions – the British Museum currently has 24 items on loan to the Cycladic museum.
However the chances of securing the loan in time for the exhibition may be harmed by the news that the British Museum is seriously entertaining bids for further Elgin Marbles loans to museums outside of Greece.
“Three serious bids are being considered,” The Art Newspaper reports, including one informal loan request made before the Hermitage deal was revealed.
New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, Berlin’s museums and the Louvre in Paris are the kind of institutions which “stand the best chance of success” when formal loan requests are submitted, the art title suggested.
The British Museum would expect any museum to which it lends the Parthenon sculptures to “be generous in responding to loan requests” made in return by the London body. Requests for single sculptures will be more favourably received, it is suggested. Bids are also expected from the UK’s regional museums which could expect huge interest in displaying items from the famous collection.
The Museum confirmed that further loans from the Elgin sculptures are being considered. A spokesman said: “Museums around the world have shown interest in requesting to loan from our set of Parthenon sculptures, and we always welcome these conversations. The Trustees will consider any request for any part of the collection to be borrowed and then returned, subject to the usual considerations of condition and fitness to travel and this has always been made clear to the world.”
Further Marbles loans will inflame tensions with Athens. Antonis Samaras, the Greek prime minister, described the loan of the Parthenon sculpture to the Hermitage as “an affront to the Greek people”.
Some of the Marbles will be moved from their permanent display to the temporary exhibition gallery for the British Museum’s March show, including the pediment sculptures of Ilissos, which will be returning from Russia, Iris and Dionysos.
However time is running out to strike an agreement with the Museum of Cycladic Art for the work that the London museum is seeking. The British Museum spokesman said: “We have requested to borrow one object from Greece and await the official response. The Museum has very positive working relationships with colleagues in Greece and lends extensively to museums in Greece including 24 objects on loan to two temporary exhibitions at the Museum of Cycladic Art in Athens.”
The Athens museum declined a request to comment. A source said: “The museum is happy in principle to lend the work but the Greek government is stalling on the paperwork.”
Greece refuses to recognise the British Museum’s ownership of the sculptures, which make up about 30 per cent of the surviving decoration from the Parthenon.
Author: Adam Sherwin | Source: The Independent [January 06, 2015]
The cave paintings of the Altamira caves in the northern Spain region Cantabria, one of the most important in the world and recognized as World Heritage, will be put at risk by the reopening of them to the public.Bison from the Cave of Altamira in Spain, considered the Sistine Chapel of cave painting [Credit: The Gallery Colection/Corbis]
El Pais on Thursday reported that the Pre-History Department of Madrid's Complutense University had sent a letter to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) criticizing the cave management and saying that ''the new program of the Spanish culture ministry, a plan that entails the opening of the cave to visitors, raises important questions about conservation and puts fragile heritage that is enormously important for the understanding of Paleolithic society at risk.''
The letter, signed by 17 professors, was also backed by the History Institute of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), which 70 researchers are part of. The letter, on the webpage of the Pre-History Department, stated that the ''actions undertaken by the culture ministry are a clear threat to conservation'' of heritage that should be preserved for future generations. It also urges UNESCO and other international organizations involved in heritage conservation to ''take note of the risks that political decisions entail'' for Altamira.
The site, closed to the public since 2002 after a report commissioned by the culture ministry and a team led by the French national Gael de Guichen, was reopened in 2012 to selected visits by small groups of five people and a guide. In one year, 250 people visited the caves, according to the program that ended in February. The next meeting of Altamira sponsors will have to decide whether to make the visits a regular occurrence. Experts say that this would lead to irreversible damage.
An international investigation into antiquities looted from India and smuggled into the United States has taken authorities to the Honolulu Museum of Art.One of the seven stolen artifacts on display at the Honolulu Museum of Art [Credit: AP/Caleb Jones]
The museum on Wednesday handed over seven rare artifacts that it acquired without museum officials realizing they were ill-gotten items. Agents from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will take the items back to New York and, from there, eventually return them to the government of India.
U.S. customs agents say the items were taken from religious temples and ancient Buddhist sites, and then allegedly smuggled to the United States by an art dealer. The dealer, Subhash Kapoor, was arrested in 2011 and is awaiting trial in India. Officials say Kapoor created false provenances for the illicit antiquities.
Someone on vacation visiting the museum last year recognized the name of Kapoor's New York gallery as the source of a 2,000-year-old terra cotta rattle and contacted authorities, said Stephan Jost, the museum's director. Museum officials then pored over their records and determined six other Indian items had ties to Kapoor.
Kapoor donated one of the items and sold five to the museum, Jost said. One was a gift from someone else.
Agents are hailing the Honolulu museum for being the first U.S. institution to publicly and easily cooperate with the investigation, dubbed "Operation Hidden Idol," involving four arrests and the recovery of thousands of pieces worth a total of $150 million.
"Owning stolen stuff is not part of our mission," Jost said. "I'm not sure we've done anything heroic. We just want to do the right thing."
Jost watched as agents inspected the items — the rattle, figurines, architectural fragments and tiles — and them hauled them in packed crates into a truck.
Martinez stressed there's no culpability on the museum's part, as it wasn't aware of the items' provenance when it acquired them between 1991 and 2003.
American art museums are becoming more rigorous in vetting the history of objects they acquire, Jost said. "Could we have done a better job? Sure," he said. "Were we a victim? Yes."
It's not uncommon for unsavory dealers to donate ill-gotten items for tax benefits and other reasons, said Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Brenton Easter. He's part of a group of agents in New York that focus on cultural property crime whose work includes dismantling the organizations behind the crimes and repatriating the seized pieces.
Some institutions are reluctant to come forward, partly because of the financial loss involved, Easter said.
It's very rare for evidence to come to light to show a museum has items that were illegally obtained, said James Cuno, president and CEO of the J. Paul Getty Trust.
"Claims might come from time to time. But most often those claims are based on just interest or the construction of national identity," he said. "If evidence is provided that's convincing, no museum will resist."
He cited an example from about 10 years ago when Italian police uncovered evidence revealing a number of items that were improperly removed from Italy. The U.S. museums where some of the items ended up returned them, he said.
Repatriation has become more common in the past couple of decades, said Malcom Bell, a professor of Greek and Roman art and archaeology at the University of Virginia. As a general rule of thumb, museums and art collectors avoid purchasing items exported without clear and valid documentation before 1970 — the year of a United Nations cultural agreement targeting trafficking in antiquities, he said.
"Transparency is important, and if the Honolulu museum has been open, that's probably to be applauded," Bell said.
Author: Jennifer Sinco Kelleher | Source: The Associated Press [April 02, 2015]
The famous Egyptian statue Sekhemka will not leave the United Kingdom, the UK Culture Ministry announced.Sekhemka statue banned from leaving UK after a culture minister intervened saying that the statue was a gift to the council in 1880 [Credit: Ahram Online]
A 4,000-year-old statue was sold by Northampton Borough Council (NBC) last year despite an outcry from within the UK as well as other places, including Egypt.
NBC sold the Sekhemka statue for £15.76m to an overseas buyer -- widely believed to be from Middle East -- in July to “help fund an extension to the town's museum and art gallery.”
Ed Vaizey, minister for culture, communications and creative industries decided to “place a temporary export ban” on the statue. He said the statue was "gifted" to the council in 1880.
The statue “will not be allowed to leave the country,” Vaizey said.
Arts Council England ruled earlier the sale breached the accredited standards for how museums manage their collections. Arts Council England banned Northampton Council from the Museums Association and accordingly has had a Heritage Lottery Fund bid rejected.
Vaizey’s decision is understood to be based on a recommendation by the reviewing committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA), which is administered by Arts Council England.
The RCEWA said the statue was of "outstanding aesthetic importance" and was significant in the study of "the development of private statuary and funerary religion in Egypt and the history of human self-representation."
Save the Sekhemka Action Group praised the ban on exporting the statue. It said in a statement “Our group are obviously delighted that Sekhemka will not be leaving the UK.”
However, the group, which has been campaigning for the statue for many years, remains “deeply disappointed that the situation has been allowed to escalate.”
The statement described the NBC actions as “reckless” and “threatening” the future of Northampton museum.
Author: Marwan Sultan | Source: Ahram Online [March 30, 2015]
Copyright by smart | Design Aram Dikiciyan smart urban stage is a global online project dealing with the term FUTURE OF THE CITY. We ask pioneers from metropolises around the world to question the urban status quo. the results are visions, ideas and solutions for sustainable lifestyles, modern social systems and forward-looking developments in the fields of architecture, design and technology. the worldwide event series is exhibiting ideas and solutions of forward thinking future makers. the brand behind this online project is the car manufacturer smart, which hosted special events throughout Europe during the last two years.
Now smart initiated the online project FUTURE OF THE CITY. Within their Q&A series allrounder Marcelo Burlon asked photographer Aram Dikiciyan: How would a city look like without concrete? His answer: A city without concrete is bathed in light. Burlon: A few years ago I was in the north of Brazil, in a little village called Jericoacoara and then I moved to Praia de Pipa. In this time the streets were made out of sand and all the little houses were out of wood. All was full of trees and the atmosphere during the evening is something really unbelievable. I imagined a city a hundred times bigger than this little village with the same concept. Imagine how the summer will be without all that concrete. How the kids will grow up and the older people will enjoy their last years. Dikiciyan:Throughout the life over there he found that things are generally rather unpredictable but definitely either interesting to thrilling or surprising to wondrous thus a little predictable then again. He dealt with the inconceivable which allowed him to catch a glimpse of what he called then the futurity of his own: Fragments of what could be or how it could look like. He never knew exactly what it was but it provided an insight into what could have been. So what would he have imagined about tomorrow? Life to consist of dark days and bright nights? Or rather bright days and blinding nights? Reflective surfaces, glowing and pumping? Intermittent pulsating conducting the rhythm of time? Busy veins but orderly? Kindness? Goodness? Awkwardness? Frequent beauty? Aram Dikiciyan was born in 1974 in West-Berlin. He moved to Tokyo in 2004, where he has been resident ever since. Exhibitions of his work have been held in Tokyo, Berlin and Hong Kong. He has been represented by Berlin Gallery Camera Work since 2008. FUTURE OF THE CITY
«Not a secret, that each of us is drawn by personal fears, and at times they, our fears clear up such desires which we admit to nobody», — the architect of the Concrete Moon, Antonino Cardillo philosophises. — «People always are surprised, how the culture on different continents is unlike. But it seems to me, the difference in cultures is rather doubtful. And it is frequent, as it is paradoxical, discrepancies become the unique tool in search of own individuality».
The Concrete House in suburb of Melbourn
Uniqueness of the Concrete House just in not similarity of two half. The building is constructed by request of the private person, on a rectangular site, in suburb of Melbourn. It's divided on two excellent from each other parts: one — for public — is similar to the turned ship or on the amusing concrete moon which follows directly from a lobby. Such design — an unexpected deviation from a direct way.
The Second — private — half of building is similar to a narrow and long case on which perimetre the gallery with an exit in a garden lasts.
Similarity and Distinctions
«Each of two so unlike parts introduces the mite in creation of the general harmony of the house», — the architect adds. Details of one half of building unexpectedly arise in another though are developed by different principles. So the concept of this house falls outside the limits simple understanding about two half conflicting among themselves. Design elements are interconnected, and sounding of one finds an echo in other. Especially well it is visible in a main hall in which visitors have doubts: where similarity comes to an end and distinctions begin.
