What the €100 Picasso raffle teaches us about endangered art all over the world
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Version 0 of 1. Congratulations to Jeffrey Gonano, who has won a Picasso valued at €1m for the cost of a €100 raffle ticket. But while the inclusion of a work by the the modern world's greatest artist has drawn attention to a charity auction in aid of the ancient city of Tyre in southern Lebanon, the publicity has not led to much interest in why this world heritage site needs help. In his book The Stones of Venice the Victorian critic John Ruskin says that three great empires have ruled the waves – Tyre, Venice and the British Empire. This maritime city was built by the ancient Phoenicians, a trading people who made a huge impact across the Mediterranean world. They are said to have even sailed down the Atlantic coast of Africa. They founded Carthage, a city that rivalled Rome. As for artistic riches, legend has it that purple dye was discovered in Tyre. Impressive architectural remains survive there. But as Lebanon fell into civil war in the 1970s ancient Tyre was a victim of the chaos. Money raised by the Picasso raffle will help protect the ruins of Tyre. It also serves as a reminder of one of 2013's saddest, and ongoing, cultural stories. Tyre's peril began in the civil war that ended in 1991. But this is now just one of many cultural treasures endangered by conflict and crisis. In Syria, precious places from crusader castles to ancient Christian villages have been damaged by the current war. In Egypt, museum looting took place again this year. In Italy, neglect and organised crime threaten Pompeii as economic tensions deepen. Even in affluent nations where war is not an immediate problem, the short attention spans and futurist mood of the digital age can devalue masterpieces of the past and lead to their comparative neglect. There's good news, too. Timbuktu was saved early in 2013 before all its treasures could be destroyed. The British Museum's Pompeii and Herculaneum exhibition showed why the past matters. Plenty of people care about the world's heritage. Let's hope that 2014 will not see too many marvels lost to hate, violence or indifference. They can't all be saved by raffling a Picasso. Our editors' picks for the day's top news and commentary delivered to your inbox each morning. |