The Acropolis : tales of plunder

When you have the chance to visit the world's great museums, you are usually happy: you see mummies, majestic temple facades, enormous animal sculptures, etc. We move from one country to another in a matter of steps without realizing—especially as children, because no one tells us—that many of the works we admire were acquired or even stolen during colonial conflicts.

This is the case with the Parthenon marbles, belonging to the famous temple perched on the Acropolis in Athens (which remained under Ottoman rule between the^15th and^19th centuries) and fragments of which can now be found in Germany, Italy, France, and Great Britain. There is even a room in the British Museum that was long known as "Elgin's Marbles" in honor of a Scottish aristocrat — Thomas Bruce,^7th Earl of Elgin, British ambassador to Constantinople in the early^19th century — whose team of painters, molders, and architects, at his urgent request, removed half of the Parthenon friezes, as well as one of the six caryatids from the Erechtheion temple, just opposite. Since then, Greece has been demanding their return.

The show OVTR deals with this incredible story.

THE ACROPOLIS: SHORT STORIES OF PLUNDERING is a short lecture that looks back at the removal of Greek marble using a commented slide show and readings from letters written by the protagonists of the time. These insights will help us to formulate together the question that is so pressing today: what if we returned the stolen works of art?

In November 2018, a "Report on the Restitution of African Heritage," entrusted to Bénédicte Savoy, art historian, and Felwine Sarr, writer and professor of economics, was submitted to President Macron.

The intention of this report is clear: "Restituting works of art to change our relationship with others." When will we see a report on the restitution of works looted in Europe by Europeans? When will we see a change in our relationship with others?