Archinect - News

Pope Francis announces return of Parthenon fragments in a potential precedent-setter

2022-12-20T18:39:00-05:00

Pope Francis will send back to Greece the three fragments of the Parthenon Sculptures that the Vatican Museums have held for two centuries, in the latest case of a Western museum bowing to demands for restitution of artifacts to their countries of origin.

The bequest was labeled a “donation” from the Vatican by Pope Francis, who also called it “a concrete sign of [his] sincere desire to follow in the ecumenical path of truth.”

The British Museum, meanwhile, is also reportedly in talks with Greece to return parts of its argued-over trove of Elgin Marbles as early as next year. A timeline for the Vatican's return to the Acropolis Museum has not yet been verified by either party.

Previously on Archinect: The British Museum is under fire after refusing Parthenon Marbles 3D scan

Forensic Architecture's latest investigation is a dig at one-sided Israeli archaeological pursuits

2022-04-13T12:14:00-04:00

Fresh off its recent Peabody Award win, London-based Forensic Architecture (FA) has returned to one of its most popular research sites with a new project, called “Living Archaeology in Gaza,” examining the fate of an important archaeological site under assault in the Gaza Strip.

The site in question was tentatively added to UNESCO’s list of World Heritage Sites in 2012 but has since been closed off to further archaeological research and beset by damaging new construction. The group examined ten years' worth of data collected by the French Biblical and Archaeological School of Jerusalem between 1995 and 2005 to produce 3D renderings of an ancient city called Anthedon that existed for two millennia until about the High Middle Ages.

Image: Forensic Architecture

What they discovered was that Israeli bombing and consolidation, combined with climate change-caused coastal erosion, has placed a considerable strain on the site, which counts among its ruins examples of building from the Byzant...

The British Museum is under fire after refusing Parthenon Marbles 3D scan

2022-04-04T12:16:00-04:00

The British Museum is facing legal action from one of the UK’s leading heritage preservation organisations over its refusal to allow the 3D scanning of a piece in its Parthenon marbles collection. The Institute for Digital Archaeology (IDA) said it would serve an injunction against the museum imminently, raising the stakes in the dispute between the two.

The 269-year-old institution is said to have refused a request from the Oxford-based Institute for Digital Archaeology (IDA) that would have reproduced a metope from the Acropolis’ south-facing facade for an important proof of concept. The scans are supposed to allow for a robotic replication process that can manipulate the original Pentelic marble material to “sub-millimeter” accuracy, according to the IDA.

Previously on Archinect: The UK is once again declining to change its stance on the Parthenon Marbles following a UNESCO statement

“Our aim is to give people a chance to see just how extraordinary a copy can be,” the Institute’s executive director Roger Michel told the Guardian. “Copies [of the Parthenon sculptures] in the past have been low-quality plaster casts. This will be orders of magnitude better. It will help people see and feel the potential of this technology in ways mere words can’t describe.”

The IDA nevertheless attempted last week to create a 3D scan using an “iPad ...

The UK is once again declining to change its stance on the Parthenon Marbles following a UNESCO statement

2021-10-06T16:43:00-04:00

The fate of the British Museum’s heavily contested Parthenon Marbles (also referred to as the Elgin Marbles) has once again come under clout after the UK decided to reject UNESCO’s request to reassess its position on repatriating the 2,500-year-old relics to their country of origin.

The UK is continuing on their insistence that the marbles were acquired through a legal means in the form of a contested firman granted to their namesake the Earl of Elgin by the Ottoman Empire around 1801.

The UN’s cultural arm had issued a statement at a recent ICPRCP meeting outlining its position that the dispute indeed constitutes an “intergovernmental issue” and not, as both the government and museum claim, an institutional one that can be sorted out “independently of the government and free from political interference,” according to UK officials.

Previously on Archinect: Brexit could force British Museum to return Parthenon Marbles to Greece

“The Museum is a unique resource for the world: the brea...

Brexit could force British Museum to return Parthenon Marbles to Greece

2020-02-18T18:39:00-05:00

As the United Kingdom works to strike new trade deals with Europe following Brexit, Greek authorities are using the occasion to try and negotiate a return of the country's long-lost Parthenon Marbles (also referred to as the Elgin Marbles).

Reuters reports that Greek officials have included new language supporting repatriation of the marbles in a document crafted by the 27 European Union nations that will envision the group's new economic and cultural relationship with the United Kingdom following its exit from the EU on January 31, 2020.

A detail view of the statuary. Image courtesy of Wikimedia user Ejectgoose.

The document, according to Reuters, seeks the “return or restitution of unlawfully removed cultural objects to their countries of origin” and comes as Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis makes a formal offer to British Museum authorities, where the marbles are currently held, to temporarily trade the Parthenon Marbles for a series of ancient Greek artifacts that "have...