The Parthenon Report: The Crime and The Criminal (Part 2)
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that we’ve driven them out of their temples,
doesn’t mean at all that the gods are dead.
– IONIAN, Constantine Cavafy
PART 2: MOTIVE MATTERS
“The plans for my house in Scotland should be known to you… The Hall is intended to be adorned with columns… If each column were different…I should think the effect would be admirable, but perhaps better if there were two of each kind. In either case I should wish to collect as much marble as possible. I have other places in my house which need it… You do not need any prompting from me to know the value that is attached to a sculptured marble or historic piece.”
With the spirit of the Greek Revolution of 1821 in our hearts and minds, Elly Symons, Co-Founder of the Acropolis Research Group and Vice President of the Australian Parthenon Committee, met with the Greek Culture Minister, Dr Lina Mendoni, to discuss the Parthenon Sculptures campaign.
Recent comments by British PM Boris Johnson and Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden continue to highlight the British side’s intransigence. This stonewalling continues to frustrate Hellenes and Philhellenes the world over.
For many years the British position resorted to various straw-man arguments, the most obvious one being that there was ‘nowhere to display them’. This argument was of course rendered otiose with the opening of the sublime Acropolis Museum which beautifully displays the extant half of the sculptures. In London, the other half remain isolated and decontextualized in the gloomy confines of the British Museum’s Duveen Gallery.