2019 (Print)
We live in a time when established taxonomies beg to be reframed, so as to embrace emerging imaginaries and respond to shifting historicities, archaeologies, and topographies. The project reacts to this necessity for radical redefinition and reorganization, especially that of the institutions of the West, which often hold artworks, artifacts, and material culture displaced from their original contexts and communities. With the ICOM (International Committee of Museums) Code of Ethics as foundational premise, it surveys the ongoing battle between nations and cultural institutions in the negotiation for the permanent return of the Parthenon marbles back to Athens. Not returning is not a neutral act:* to return would mean to actively surrender; and if the history of collecting and collections has taught us anything is that ownership means power, and it is not in the conqueror-collector’s nature to leave anything behind.
Research/design project for the occasion of the Expanded Museum Academy’s Residency exhibition held in Athens in September 2019.
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