[vinnomot] Tintin in Bengal, or Musee Guimet Controversy

 

1.NEW: Musee Guimet: Response From Person Involved In Show
2.NEW: Response: Asterix & The Big Fight
3.NEW: French Embassy Response, Dec 4th

 

Tintin in Bengal, or Musee Guimet Controversy
Naeem Mohaiemen
[Originally posted Dec 1st, revised December 4th]

The two month controversy simmering over the loan of centuries old artifacts to Musee Guimet abruptly boiled over Friday. On the Jumma day of rest, a time when many are sleeping in, relaxing, addafying, or contemplating unfinished art projects, a convoy of trucks were loaded with crates of artifacts from the National Museum. Headed to ZIA airport, en route to Paris. Is Paris burning, what's the rush..?

The French Embassy and some GOB officials had decided that matters had dragged on long enough. The show was supposed to open in October, but Bangladesh citizen groups had thrown a chaku in the works with lawsuits, press conferences, statements and protests. When the courts "vacated" the lawsuit blocking the loan on Thursday, the first shipment got underway in defiance of good manners. Word leaked out, protesters gathered, signs were held, human chains formed, one protester arrested. By the time more people arrived, the trucks were gone.

When the controversy first bubbled up, many of us were too confused to take sides. On both sides of the fence were cultural producers/activists whom we respected. Even the lawyers representing two parties were familiar activists. One friend said to me "boba r shotru nai (the deaf-mute has no enemies), best to stay silent bhai. Too many big guns on both sides." The opposition to the loan felt like kneejerk nationalism to me. The French are the good guys no, isn't it Americans we're all afraid of now?

The French Ambassador said protesters' concerns are "objectionable and insulting". Bit foolish that, very undiplomatic language– guaranteed to get everyone's hackles up. I spent too much time reading Tintin in my wasted youth. But a translated Tintin in Congo remained elusive until I found a bootleg copy in Nilkhet where Tintin is teaching African natives "Repeat after me, Belgium is your motherland". Rubber-lipped sambos. Yessa boss. Did King Leopold collect art as well? But Zafar Sobhan pointed out that I was making too tendentious a point to link

I went down to the Alliance Francaise cafe, five blocks from my home, to investigate. If there was so much opposition inside Bangladesh, shouldn't the Guimet at least show courtesy/sensitivity and delay until the issue is resolved? Tish tosh explained the man at the next table: "the people who oppose the loan just don't want the world to know that this region has such an incredible pre-Islamic heritage." Those who oppose this loan are the enemies of globalization doesn't make sense either. Shishir Bhattacharjee?

But the protesters' position also keeps shifting. First their approach seems reasonable. Then I read their statements and find major flaws. When I point these flaws out, I am treated to a deep freeze. Apparently I am only an ally as long as I toe the line. The initial opposition was focused on the esoteric edges of the debate (if the plane crashes, send replicas, why 4 months, etc), rather than the hard facts. But the hard facts that have been brought out also seem to have holes in them– as I discovered after studying the French embassy+Guimet response.

The protesters' concerns, as far as I have been able to untangle them so far [comments in brackets marked 'UPDATE" are later findings through my own research. Unfortunately, many of protesters' concerns that I accepted to be valid later turned out to not be exactly correct]:

1. Lack of documentation
a) set of coins catalogued as "coins", with no specifics. inconsistent numbers ("50 silver coins, and 8 gold coins" at Dec 3 Bangladesh government press conference, "50 punchmarked coins" in one set of court records, "gold and silver coins" in another record, "93 punch marked coins" in the French inventory)
b) missing accession numbers (no accession number for large and extremely rare bronze statue the Vajrasattva, insured at 200,000 Euro) [UPDATE: This is wrong, there are accession numbers for everything, including this piece]
c) mismatch between number of pieces documented by the French photographer who catalogued the show, the number given in French embassy contract, and the number in Embassy's press release. incomplete descriptions, missing descriptions on the Bangladesh side. [UPDATE: The mismatches appear on Bangladesh side, not on French side]
d) insurance value of 4 million Euros, for a collection that dates back to 4th century BC. An international archaeological expert has since called this appraisal "financial fraud". 4 million Euro as per French press release of 25th September, 2.6 million Euro at Dec 3 Bangladesh government press conference. [UPDATE: French have since announced they are raising the insurance by 30%, but I haven't seen a final number reported.]

2. Guimet as a Signifier
There's no doubt that some/many of the items in #1 were caused by incompetence of the Bangladesh side. This is also a legacy project from BNP time, so the chain of ownership is quite muddled. But if Bangladesh officials are incapable of protecting their own national heritage, what is the Musee Guimet's responsibility? Truth of the matter is, the bulk of the art looting from Bangladesh already happened from 1960-1990. Lot of people's frustrations are getting focused now, at the tail end. But often people get galvanized when the problem is made visible through unexpected shards of glass.

The Guimet controversy has become a crucible—because people can see the issues take shape in front of their face, in the form of trucks under police guard, undervaluing, 20 catalogues, etc. It is much harder to crystallize the issue when talking about the V&A, or a collection that was built up before many of the protesters were born. Guimet is taking on the burden not only of its own history (especially post 1945 acquisition of the Louvre's Asiatic collection, a portion of which was definitely looted property) and this particular fiasco, but is also acting as a signifier for a whole set of colonial/post-colonial museums' bounty of illegally acquired artifacts.

This is a symbolic battle more than a real one, and in the main a civil war between two factions of Bangla civil society/culture workers. The French are often in the baffled role of bystanders, scratching their heads and saying "these Gauls are crazy".

3. Precedent for Art Anxiety
When the French Embassy makes a absolutist statement, protesters get further enflamed. The Embassy press statement released contained surprisingly undiplomatic language. I think "really lousy at their job" is a fair summary of some of the players involved. Some examples:

a) Guimet is not in the business of stolen artifacts
Kwame Opoku's statement on Afrikanet "Musée Guimet in Paris which incidentally also holds thousands of stolen/illegal objects from China and the rest of Asia" gets people nervous, even if that bountry was looted prior to Guimet acquisition.

b) French cooperation has been vital to recovering artefacts from excavations
True. Guimet director Jean-Francois Jarriage in the late 50's worked in the department of archeology in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan). However, protesters talk about a relic casket that was taken to France for restoration during this period. I haven't seen any evidence linking Jarriage to this transfer, so not sure how much basis this is.

c) No legal basis for Guimet to keep the artefacts. They are contract bound to return.
This is true. If you analyze it rationally.

This issue mainly seems to have come up because Louvre is one of 18 museums that have signed a Declaration on Importance and Value of Universal Museums. The Louvre-signed declaration is alleged to be in opposition to the UNESCO Convention on Stolen and Illegally Exported Cultural Objects (1995). Why does this matter– because some say the Declaration can be interpreted to argue that if an artefact is in danger in its home country (e.g., Buddhas of Bamiyan in Afghanistan), it should be preserved in a universal museum for safety– if the argument could be made that relics are being damaged/stolen due to poor conditions in Bangladesh, one could argue that they would be safer in the Guimet. But Bangladesh is not Aghanistan, so the chances that this argument would ever be made seem highly unlikely.

But it's Louvre that signed it, not Guimet? Well, the confusion comes because Guimet received its Asian collection from Louvre in late 1940s, as part of an exchange with Louvre where Guimet's Africa collection was exchanged for Louvre's Asian collection. Therefore some have wondered whether Louvre's signing of the Declaration covers Guimet as well (according to a London curator I asked, it doesn't).

4. The Robbery Jitters
Rational people should not be worried that the Guimet itself will steal or keep the artifacts (although lot of the protesters are). The issue here is about art robbery which is, as per references @ end, now the 4th largest form of crime in the world. Here two issues come in:
a. The overall budget for the show (including shonar bangla fashion show etc)– whether adequate security can be provided for the show with that budget.
b. This is where the insurance value becomes crucial. If a 8 million Euro artifact is stolen from the show, and the entire show is insured for 4 million E (or 2.6 million E as per GOB today), you can see the problem.

5. Is Compromise Possible?
It doesn't seem like anyone is interested in compromise. Possible the symbolic nature of this battle and the momentum of the movement (esp. in the absence of any other movements) is unstoppable. Compromise is unsexy and for wimps. We Bengalis have never been much for compromise anyway.

An initial draft of the Experts' Letter to the French Government (full letter @ end of this email) included this conciliatory paragraph:

"We urge the French government and citizens, museum professionals, preservationists and all global cultural practitioners to demand that Musee Guimet immediately cease plans for the "Masterpieces of the Ganges Delta" show until each archaeological artifact in the Bangladesh collection has been examined, photographed, catalogued, appraised and insurance value set by an international panel of experts. Guimet must also take all due diligence steps to resolve the discrepancy between documents, number of items, accession numbers and all other issues that have given rise to questions about lack of transparency in the entire process."

But Friday's incident hardened positions and the concluding paragraph now reads:

"While we were originally open to the idea of showing the work at Musee Guimet provided the transparency issues were addressed, the recent actions of the museum has removed any semblance of trust in the organisation, and we are no longer willing to loan our prized possessions to an organisation with such standards of behaviour. The incident, originally restricted to the issue of an exhibition now appears to have created a general distrust in the French government amongst the Bangladeshi public."

6. On National Pride Of A Small Nation
Bangladesh gets such a very small share of international cultural attention. Our prevailing attitude is that any positive global attention is good. Especially after being hit by both flood and cyclone (two months apart) this year, some people may be yearning for some positive "image building". This has historically led to a broken-spine approach to European and Northern cultural institutions. The face-off with Musee Guimet seems to be an attempt to make amends– but also runs the risk of running in an extreme other direction, teetering on xenophobia and histrionics.

What next?

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Further Reading:
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1. A Pro-Musee Guimet POV: Asterix & The Big Fight]

2.Musee Guimet: Response From Person Involved In Show. French Embassy Response, Dec 4th, 2007. Earlier responses from French Embassy:Bangladeshi Protesters are"Misleading the public again!", Protesters concerns are "objectionable and insulting"

3. Fact-Finding Committee Report: Pg 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

4. Protesters Battle Police As Musee Guimet Trucks Roll Out

5. Lala Rukh Selim: In response to the French

6. Shahidul Alam: The Candy Man, Price of Priceless Objects, Missing Jigsaw Pieces

7. Letter To The French Government & Citizens

8. Anisur Rahman: Collected Media Reports

9. Kwame Opoku: Musee Guimet holds "thousands of stolen objects". Afrikanet: France & The Stolen Art Of Others. Louvre refuses Turkish demand for Ottoman Tiles. Chinese Cultural Relics

10. Major Robberies At French Museums. Art theft 4th largest criminal enterprise

11. Declaration on the Importance and Value of Universal Museums

12. Documentation with missing Accession Numbers: 1, 2. Contract Between Culture Ministry & French Ambassador

 

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