http://lookingaround.blogs.time.com/2007/11/27/a_talk_with_philippe_de_monteb/ Reflections on art and architecture by TIME critic Richard Lacayo. Tue, 01 Dec 2009 18:06:59 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 http://lookingaround.blogs.time.com/2007/11/27/a_talk_with_philippe_de_monteb/comment-page-1/#comment-173 Dr Selby Whittingham Sat, 01 Dec 2007 12:29:43 +0000 http://lookingaround.blogs.time.com/2007/11/27/a_talk_with_philippe_de_monteb/#comment-173 Philippe de Montebello predictably takes the museum point of view: that the collecting of artefacts in a few Western metropolitan museums promotes their study, and that preserving the link with their place of origin is a minor consideration. But artefacts were not made for academic study. Oriel College at Oxford has just had a portrait at Trinity College, Oxford, copied. (The importance of the sitter, Thomas Harriot, a former college student, has only recently been recognised). From the aesthetic and academic point of view the money spent on a copy was a waste, and anyone interested in Harriot could easily see the original at Trinity. But the portrait is a monument, not just a work of art. Other artefacts have national significance. That may be of no concern to de Montebello, but it is to a larger body of people than those whom he represents. He says that attitudes change, and so are those to restitution. It may be convenient to have a cut-off point making claims invalid after 100 years or limiting them to heirs of victims of the Holocaust, but what matters is the strength of the claim, the upholding of rights and the public good defined broadly to take in the many considerations involved. Philippe de Montebello predictably takes the museum point of view: that the collecting of artefacts in a few Western metropolitan museums promotes their study, and that preserving the link with their place of origin is a minor consideration. But artefacts were not made for academic study. Oriel College at Oxford has just had a portrait at Trinity College, Oxford, copied. (The importance of the sitter, Thomas Harriot, a former college student, has only recently been recognised). From the aesthetic and academic point of view the money spent on a copy was a waste, and anyone interested in Harriot could easily see the original at Trinity. But the portrait is a monument, not just a work of art. Other artefacts have national significance. That may be of no concern to de Montebello, but it is to a larger body of people than those whom he represents. He says that attitudes change, and so are those to restitution. It may be convenient to have a cut-off point making claims invalid after 100 years or limiting them to heirs of victims of the Holocaust, but what matters is the strength of the claim, the upholding of rights and the public good defined broadly to take in the many considerations involved.

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