BlogBack: Hispanic Society Habitué Decries Koran Deaccessions

Ted Gallagher, a self-described attorney "with a strong amateur art historic streak" and a B.A. in Spanish art and history, responds to Hispanic Society's Koran Deaccessions:

Sadly, the sale by the Hispanic Society of America of unique Koranic manuscripts for fast cash is yet another case of public art treasures being shed in the name of "mission shift."

The Hispanic Society of America does not overstate the quality of its collections as "unparalleled in their scope and quality outside the Iberian Peninsula, addressing nearly every aspect of culture in Spain." Perhaps I am wrong, but when invading forces impose Islam as the dominant state religion in a previously Christian country for eight centuries, from A.D. 711 until 1492, and that country's Christian population is in a continuous war of reconquest to rid the infidels, leading to a fervor of Christianity in the 16th century that manifested itself in the Inquisition, I would say the earliest complete, dated Koran would be well at home in such a museum as a great art-historical treasure. At least the museum founder believed this to be so.

I now live in Inwood, and spent a year's worth of Saturdays in the neighborhood Hispanic Society library, studying Velázquez, Zurbarán and others of the Sevillian school. The Society is a national treasure, and this loss is heavy on us.

October 26, 2007 12:00 AM | | Comments (0)

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Me Elsewhere

Highlights from my writings and broadcasts: 


MY BOOK
The Complete Guide to Collecting Art (Knopf)

IN THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA
NY TIMES OP-EDS:
For Sale: Our Permanent Collection (museum deaccessions)
Fashion Victim (Chanel at the Met)
Destroying the Museum to Save It (Barnes Foundation)
Reassembling Sundered Antiquities (Parthenon marbles)

WALL STREET JOURNAL:
Los Angeles' New Broad Museum of Contemporary Art
Philadelphia's New Perelman Building
The Walton Effect: Art World Is Roiled by Wal-Mart Heiress

Tricks of the Auction Trade

The Seattle Art Museum: A Work in Progress

Upside Down and Backward, Yet Tame (Boston ICA)
Edith Wharton's Library Is Now an Open Book
Extreme Makeover: Smithsonian Edition (American Art and Portrait Gallery renovation)
This Museum's Expansion is Simply Effective (Minneapolis Institute)
Truth in Booty: Coming--and Staying--Clean (antiquities controversies)
A Betrayal of Trust (NY Public Library's art sales)
The Lost Museum (MoMA's art sales)
Endangered Species (single-collector jewel-box museums)
Money in Motion (the Guggenheim's finances)
The Fine Art of Genocide? (appraisals of Hitler's art)

LA TIMES OP-EDS:
Make Art Loans, Not War
Museums Can't Compete (public collecting endangered)

ART IN AMERICA:
Refreshing the Smithsonian (the renovated SAAM and NPG)
The Atrium That Ate the Morgan (Renzo Piano's addition)
Hot Pots and Potshots (controversies over museum antiquities)
Musings on Museums (book review of "Whose Muse?")

NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO:
Criticism of AAM's Cultural Diplomacy Initiative

NEW YORK PUBLIC RADIO:
Guggenheim Director Steps Down
Philippe de Montebello's Retirement
Fall '07 Art Auctions
Metropolitan Museum's "Age of Rembrandt" Show
Commentary on the Art Market
Tour of Sculpture Gardens, with Slideshow
Audio Commentary on the Met's New Greek and Roman Galleries
Glenn Lowry's Unorthodox Compensation Package
Commentary on the Art Market

PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC RADIO:
Museums' Purchase and Sale of Eakins' Works (about one-third of the way into the program)
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts' sale of Eakins' "The Cello Player"

BBC-TV:
Impressionist/Modern Auction at Sotheby's

more of me elsewhere

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About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by CultureGrrl published on October 26, 2007 12:00 AM.

Goya Arrest Update: The Girlfriend Talks was the previous entry in this blog.

Cultural Exchange (or not), British-Russian Style is the next entry in this blog.

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