Arts: Sculpture: A visual art in the round, is put in the ring to go a round

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Originally published on May25,2k6 on refWrite page 3.
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Billions of dollars are being made, and paid, for artworks and artifacts (much of it in the sculpture category) that slosh and slush from the dark corners of what we call "Antiquities."
R+t now, Iraq is one of the main centers of this avaracious trade, and US Marine Reserve Officer, Colonel Bogdanos (no first name given for this lawyer) is the guy who led the search for the looted arts of the ancient cities of otherwise longlost civilizations. 5,500 have been recovered; another 7,000 are still missing. Probably not much of what's missing is in private collections yet, but wharehoused by the thieves.

To move "a stolen antiquity from an archaeological site in the middle of the night to a Manhattan townhouse - there is some serious organization here, and it's pretty eye-opening," he says.

The level of pillaging that is taking place frustrates archaeologists. "We have aerial photographs and satellite photographs - it's just absolutely horrendous what has happened," says Piotr Michalowski, a professor in the Near Eastern Studies department at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. "Whole cities are being dug up and disappearing off the face of the earth."

The number of archaeological sites being excavated in Iraq has risen in the past decade. Today, some 2,600 guards from Iraq's security forces are charged with protecting about 10,000 sites.

So reports Kate Moser, reporting in Hunt conitnues for illegal antiquities, Christian Science Monitor (May4, 2k6).

Gloria Goodale tells us quite a diffrent story in her piece on the Getty Museum's two locations in California, one at Brentwood and the other at Malibu, At Getty's two campuses, strinkingly different gardens, CSM (May,2k6)

Gardens at the two Getty Museum campuses could not be more different. California artist Robert Irwin's central garden at the Brentwood Center is a constantly changing, off-balance geometric splash of color and texture. It's a stark contrast to the beige classicism of the towering, marble buildings above it. Conversely, the elegant Mediterranean-style landscaping of the newly reopened Getty Villa in nearby Malibu is an understated partner to the estate it surrounds.

Nonetheless, the two gardens share a dramatic spirit: One is a work of living sculpture, the other a piece of horticultural theater.

It's the metaphor in the one case of "a work of living sculpture" that drew me to Goodale's article on "scardens." I strongly recommend her piece. The next item I can't recommend for the inherent pleasurablity of its contents. Quite the opposite.

This one's out of Egypt where the chief religious officer of the society's Sunni Islam has barked a resounding No at sculpture, including the great legacy of Egypt's ancient treasures from the Pharoahs. Egypt's grand mufti issues fatwa: no sculpture, by CSM's Ursula Lindsey (Apr18,2k6).

In his fatwa - or religious ruling - issued earlier this month, Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa quoted a saying of the prophet Muhammad that sculptors will be among those receiving the harshest punishment on Judgment Day.

Artists and intellectuals here say the edict, whose ban on producing and displaying sculptures overturns a century-old fatwa, runs counter to Islam. They also worry that extremists may use the ruling as a pretense for destroying Egypt's ancient relics, which form a pillar of the country's multibillion-dollar tourist industry.

"I was shocked," says art critic Ashraf Ibrahim. "Islam is not against art."

Though Mr. Ibrahim acknowledges that in the early days of Islam, the prophet Muhammad destroyed statues and criticized sculptors in a bid to end idolatry, he says that's no longer necessary.

"No one for sure is going to worship a statue now," says Ibrahim. "The reason to forbid statues is finished."

The concept of sculpture mentioned in one of the quoted remarks focusses on three-dimensionality, but this does not in itself rule out bas-relief either, where you can't walk around the artwork and view it from every angle of a circle of 380 degrees. - Anaximaximium.

Further resources:

Environmental Sculpture
Pithy statement of sculpture's variety today

aesthetics, arts, sculpture, sculpturetoday, sculptureancient, archeology, sculpturenvironmental, sculptureegyptfatwa, antiquitieslooted

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• archeology
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• sculptureegyptfatwa
• antiquitieslooted