One of the world’s largest art collections is in the British Museum. Another of the largest is in the Louvre in Paris, and it’s no surprise that there has been much debate over the years about how both museums acquired their art. The common narrative is that they have ‘looted’ half the world’s relics (they don’t really own them anymore) and that countries are taking their stuff back.

The British Museum doesn’t want to hear about this, so a group of historians and archaeologists took matters into their own hands. Like? Scanning the artefacts without permission, making exact replicas in marble and presenting them to the museum.

We return to the Parthenon. Greece has been demanding for years to get justice for its heritage in relation to the Parthenon, one of the most visited and defining monuments of the world, the best works of which are in London. This is because at the beginning of the 19th century, Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin, bought the 75-metre frieze, 15 metopes and 17 statues and later sold them to the British State for 35,000 pounds. This ended up in the British Museum.

Greece sees it as an illegitimate gesture and has been demanding its return for years. In protest, they even built the New Acropolis Museum, complete with a floor full of empty shelves called the “Exiled Elgin Marbles.” English They return things that they consider to be theirs.

Archaeologists on the warpath. The museum doesn’t seem willing to give up, and the ‘funny’ part is that a group of British archaeologists and historians are waging a ‘guerrilla war’ against the museum. ‘Things the English Stole’ – which literally translates as ‘things the English stole’ – is a documentary about the investigation of relics in the hands of the English. In one of the very interesting episodes, by the way, we meet Roger Michel, a digital archaeologist with a very interesting position:

“If we can make perfect copies of the Parthenon sculptures, visitors will have the same experience when they come to the British Museum.” And these copies are truly perfect: using tools such as an iPad with a LiDAR sensor, they scanned all the elements of the Parthenon and converted this data into 1:1 copies made of marble.

The museum didn’t like thisWhen asked by Marc Fennell, director of the Australian television documentary, about the museum’s reaction when they were approached about the idea, Michael admits that it was not positive: “The museum had decided at the time to take a very strong stance against the project. So of course we did it anyway and started a guerrilla war.

Wait, how could they scan the sculptures if the museum was against it? Roger says they read the museum’s regulations carefully, and there’s a section that says visitors can use 3D scanning equipment to scan the pieces, and that visitors can use the products of those 3D scans for any purpose, as long as it’s not commercial.

And they have their reasons. Roger assures us that the Parthenon’s sculptures, in their current state of preservation, teach the visitor absolutely nothing. “They actually misinform people about the aesthetics of antiquity,” says Michael. This is because they are painted in bright colors that would not have been applicable to the originals, but could only be applied to marble copies.

This way, the museum will be able to display replicas of the artifacts painted to represent their ancient state as closely as possible, thus providing a history lesson to museum visitors.

Conservation debate. It would also put an end to a decades-long problem. “The Greeks will get their valuables back and everyone will be happy. That was the plan,” Michel says, but it seems unlikely that the Parthenon’s sculptures and pieces will be able to return home so easily. The British Museum and the UK believe that the museum can protect its treasures better than others.

Furthermore, in 1753 the British government passed a law expressly prohibiting the release of any piece unless it was a copy. The reasons behind the decision were the welfare and preservation of the works, and also because the government had noted a few years earlier that these works could not be as well preserved in their countries of origin as they were in the British Museum.

After all, it also comes down to money. The ruins of the Parthenon are a ruthless tourist attraction for the museum, and they have always defended themselves by claiming that the deal between England and Thomas Bruce was perfectly legal, and therefore these antiquities belong to them. There is a debate in the streets and in Parliament, but we will see what it turns out to be.

Pictures | Things the British Steal, ABC

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