"Yes,
its interesting, because the case of the stucco figure at the Metropolitan
Museum of Art in New York is really embarrassing, because Huvishka (Mustamandy)
has a slide which proves the origin as a works excavated by his father.
They refuse to admit the origin of the piece. The Mustamandys wrote several
letters. I also wrote a letter. I said, 'if one of those planes crashed
into the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the museum was looted and the
artworks were sold to a museum in Japan, what would you think about that?
What would you say to that Museum?"
To
reconstruct the statues and rebuild the National Museum of Kabul is an
incredible task. "You can't build a museum if there is nothing inside,"
said Kamansky. The odds of gaining cooperation from museums, of gaining
the funds to buy back from collectors, or to seize their works through
legal means, is almost impossible. That is the way it will be - dead trails
and dark corridors.
This
rubbled shrine of human history we call the Kabul Museum is an empty skull.
The knowledge and evidence of Central Asia lies in graves. Only the wind
hears the voice of the past's great cultural crossroad. Perhaps a day
of man's history has ended. How bare the future without its past. But
there is something out there - a call for reconstruction, or a letter
from a museum. Untold complexities await the war of the antiquities.
Special
Thanks to:
David
Kamansky Director General of the Pacific Asia Museum (http://www.pacificasiamuseum.org)
Ellen Herscher of the Archaeological Institute of America
Bernard Weber of New 7 Wonders Society (http://www.new7wonders.com)
Paul Bucherer of the Afghanistan Museum and New 7 Wonders Society
Kurt Behrendt of Temple University
Huvishka Mustamandy of ICSCHA
Craig Lesh, Vice President of the Archaeological
Survey Association of Southern California
Jonathan Reed of LaVerne University
Wigbert Böll of the WebdaK World Culture Group http://www.webdak.com/journal.html
The voice of Isabella Delasantos, who will forever remain anonymous
Scott Hill of http://www.morphizm.com
The staff at UNESCO
)
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