China’s Art Market Is Not for Foreigners

China’s Art Market Is Booming – But Not for Foreigners As China’s auction houses expand abroad, foreign firms are tightly restricted from entering the booming Chinese market.

The demand for Chinese art and antiquities is booming. But despite the buying frenzy, China’s domestic market remains highly controlled, with the government restricting foreign firms’ access while aggressively encouraging Chinese firms to expand overseas. This market distortion doesn’t just artificially help Chinese auction houses – it could also fundamentally change the standards of the art market today. Today, China’s art and antiquities market rivals the United States as one of the largest in the world, with annual revenues of close to $12 billion – and growing. While sales in New York recently fell to half of their previous year’s level, they rose by 20 percent in China. This difference is even more striking given slowing growth in China and Beijing’s crackdown on sales of luxury goods.

This is so unfair, US dealers are alre3ady disadvantaged by the MOU ste department officials signed together with with China's repressive Coommunist regime. Let us all hope that the Trump Administration will perform a cost benefit analysis of such restrictions and their impact on various stake holders.

Iraq Wants our Money to Reclaim Heritage Lost to Islamic State Extremists

Iraqi officials are calling for international help to reclaim archaeological sites and other heritage destroyed by Islamic State extremists. A two-day gathering at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization headquarters in Paris beginning Thursday brought experts in archeology, scholars and diplomats together with officials from Iraq. The meeting's goal is a plan to preserve and rebuild the cultural heritage damaged and destroyed by the Islamic State group.Let us hope that this leads to an improvement on their previous poor stewardship of their non-Islamic heritage.

Horns of Consecration

Crete - Surreal image of the moonlight illuminating the "Horns of Consecration", the symbol ubiquitous in Minoan civilization (V.Tagoudis)

Turkish Publisher Shuts Down Magazine for Printing Moses Cartoon

 

This is so childish: reportedly, the oldest Turkish satirical magazine has shut down due to a "blasphemous" cartoon that depicted Moses. After the office of President Erdoğan condemned the cartoon, the publisher of Gırgır closed the magazine and threatened to file criminal complaints against staffers.

The publisher of the popular Turkish cartoon magazine Gırgır has shut down the publication because of a cartoon it ran featuring Moses, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports. The publisher also announced it would file criminal complaints against the magazine staffers responsible for the cartoon. [...] The cartoon sparked an outcry on social media, drawing criticism from both Jewish and Muslim communities in Turkey (Moses is a central figure in the Quran).

"Turkish Publisher Shuts Down Magazine for Printing Moses Cartoon"

Its Crazy to Fight the Collecting of Ancient Coins

Ancient coins are excellent teaching tools.

Their durability—and the large number of specimens available—makes them ideal collectors’ items. They encourage interest in the past, which in turn promotes educational programs in museum and universities, many of whose collections were formed or financed by hobbyists

Archeologists who attempt to smash the trade in artifacts such as coins are simply nuts. It is in their own interest that public interest in the study of the past is maintained@!Why are they so blind that they cannot see this??

The American Numismatic Association Warns Import Restrictions Damage Mission

The highly esteemed American Numismatic Association explains how import restrictions on coins that focus on place of minting in ancient times rather than modern find spots have damaged its educational mission.

since the 1990s, nations such as Italy, Cyprus and China have successfully placed restrictions on an ever-increasing range of artifacts, including ancient coins. The American Numismatic Association first became involved in the MOU process when Cyprus attempted to place such items on its restricted list. To protect the rights of American collectors, the ANA has worked with the Ancient Coin Collectors Guild and other organizations to send representatives to CPAC meetings and to address the attempts of Italy, Greece and other nations to restrict the import of ancient coins into the United States. [...] The ANA fully supports the idea of protecting cultural property, but has consistently argued that ancient coins should not be included in MOUs for a number of reasons. First, coins are among the most common and durable of artifacts (with a few notable exceptions), and therefore the information they contain is in no danger of being lost to historians or archaeologists in the way unique or rare objects would be if not preserved in cultural institutions. Additionally, there is no shortage of coins in museums in nations that have ancient specimens as part of their history, particularly Europe, the Middle East and China.

Let us all hope that the excellent Trump nce again expresses hope that one of the effects of the shakeup of the system promised by the Trump Administration will consist of an effective cost benefit analysis of such restrictions and their impact on various stake holders.

Archeologists Daestroy Baalbeck

Lebanon: Residents and activists Friday gathered at the steps of the Temple of Bacchus in the east Lebanon city of Baalbek to protest the poor restoration by archeologists of local heritage sites ("Baalbeck activists denounce poor restoration of ancient sites")

“The restoration efforts by the Council for Development and Reconstruction have been done in a careless way,” Issam al-Rifai, a local activist, said as she read a joint statement from several civil society groups. “It was apparent that there was grave damage that was the result of the detrimental methods used in the reconstruction process. This has been confirmed in a report by specialized architects.” Baalbeck Gov. Bachir Khodr spoke to local press in response to civil society’s protests, condemning the damage to the ancient Temple of Bacchus complex that dates from the second or early third century. It was classed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1984. The governor said the restoration efforts had been done in a “primitive” way and acknowledged that it had resulted in “deformities” and the removal of inscriptions. Khodr also said that the municipality filed a complaint to the Culture Ministry several months ago regarding the quality of restoration work. “Former Minister Raymond Areiji immediately responded and took action,” Khodr said. “But the committee that was sent to evaluate the situation covered up the crime.” 

This is typical of the manner in which archeologists treat criticism.