One of the Louvre mosaics from Bishapur |
Paris
offers many delights to the visitor,
and at the moment, there are three more:
- an
exhibition of Sasanian art,
- an
exhibition of Thracian objects
from recent
excavations in Bulgaria,
- and -best
of all- an
exhibition of objects from the
Afghan National
Museum in Kabul, which were believed to be lost but
miraculously
survived the difficult years of war.
I visited
them in the last days of December 2006, and here is my review.
The
Sasanians
First, Les
Perses
Sassanides. Fastes d'un Empire Oublié,
which is in the Musée
Cernuschi at the Avenue Velasquez 7.
The objects
are from several museums all over the world, although -unfortunately-
those from the Hermitage never arrived in Paris, so that buying the
catalog (45 euro) is to be recommended.
After a small anteroom with some written information on Sasanian
history, the first room contains all kinds of objects from the royal
propaganda, like dishes
with hunting scenes and full-scale copies of the rock reliefs
from Taq-e
Bostan,
which I hope will one day be exposed near the original ones, which can
not be studied from so close. In the second room you will see a/o
intaglios, coins, cameos, glass, and terracottas,
and in the third room you will see the Louvre mosaics
from Bishapur
and weapons.
The objects I liked best were the royal mantles. I
had never realized that ancient clothing could survive so well.
This exposition is certainly worth a visit, but it must be noted that
taking photos is not allowed. I sincerely regret this, because I like
to study objects later, at my leisure. When I offered to pay for an
authorization -which is possible in nearly every museum- the kind young
lady at the entrance made a phone call to her superior, but she had to
inform us that she could not obtain what I needed. This is problematic,
because buying a catalog is not a substitute for taking pictures. After
all, the
details you want to see again are never the details selected by
professional photographers. I will return to this point below. |
|
A winged horse from Vazovo (Bulgaria) |
Thracian
gold
It is easy to walk from
the Sasanian exhibition to the next one, L'Or des Thraces
at the Musée
Jacquemart-André (Boulevard Hausmann
158). Its claim to
"illustrate the great Thracian civilization", is exaggerated. As
one could have expected from an exposition called "Gold of the
Thracians", this is in fact an exhibition of artworks from tombs in
Bulgaria - nothing more or less. In other words, the organizers have
reduced "the great
Thracian civilization" to
"art". Simple questions like "who were the goldsmiths?" or "is Herodotus
a
reliable author?" remain
unanswered. On the other hand, an attempt was made to explain the
principles of Thracian religion, which I found very enlightening.
Some objects worthy of note: the Borovo treasure,
from the territory of the Bessi, consists of several lovely rhytons,
and was apparently a gift by king Cotys I to a local chief. The main
item from the Letnitsa
treasure
is a horse harness consisting of small, decorated pieces. There were
also objects related to the Odryssean king Seuthes III, which were
excavated in the Valley of the Thracian Kings (where systematic
excavations started in 2004), such as splendid helmets and the king's
gold crown.
What I like best was the Rogozen
treasure,
which consists of no less than 164 pieces and is usually on display in
the Museum of Vratsa. The phials, jugs, and goblets represent art
styles from the mid-fifth to mid-fourth century. They were buried in a
hurry, and probably were the complete treasure of one noble family that
lost power to Philip
of Macedonia
or his son Alexander
the Great. Among the objects are representations
that are surprisingly similar to the lion/bull-fight
so well-known from Achaemenid
art. I would have loved to learn more
about this.
Like so many museums, the Jacquemart-André has decided to
expose the
objects in dark rooms, in which only the objects are illuminated. This
creates a problem, however. Because much information is
offered in
excellent, small guidebooks, there are always people reading in front
of the displays.
Worse, the rooms are too small for the many visitors, and it is
impossible to study the objects at one's leisure. I left the museum a
bit
dissatisfied, although I was very happy that the friendly guards
allowed us to take photos for personal use. |
|
Cybele dish from Ai Khanum |
Afghanistan
It takes about half an
hour to walk from the Musée Jacquemart-André to
the Musée
Guimet
on the Place de Jena. The
exhibition Afghanistan,
les Trésors
Retrouvés
has received much publicity and you see leaflets everywhere in Paris.
And rightly so, because the Musée Guimet offers a
probably unique
chance to see the objects from the war-plagued country to those of us
who can
not visit the Archaeological Museum of Kabul.
The first room is devoted to the objects from Ai
Khanum,
starting with the famous Cybele
dish.
You will also see a gargoyle, the capital of a column, the Clearchus
inscription
(smaller than I expected), the sun dial, antefixes, and other objects
you have until now only known from books. There's also a column
from Herat.
The second room contains lots of gold objects from Tillia Tepe,
and the third room is devoted to Begram (Alexandria
in the
Caucasus). I was surprised to see how delicate the objects
from this last site were.
I got the impression that the Museum Guimet is overreaching itself with
this
exhibition, which -at least during the days between Christmas and Old
Year- attracts so many people that it is no longer possible
to study the objects. If you manage to reach them at all, because you
will
first have to join a queue at the Place de Jena, which lasted -when we
were there- about 40 minutes. Then, we could buy a ticket, and
learned that the queue to enter the exhibition room would take
about 40 to 120 minutes; it was impossible to buy tickets for the next
day. After some time in the second line, we could enter the first room,
but there was a third one (45 minutes) to see the gold objects.
Unlike my companion, I do not think that my hours in the museum
were a waste of time: I saw objects any student of Antiquity
simply must see. Serious scholars of the ancient Near East have no
excuse for ignoring this exposition. However, neither of us enjoyed our
stay in the overcrowded museum.
Another unpleasant surprise was that taking pictures was allowed in
the first room only, a rule the guards apparently did not
feel very comfortable with, because the lady who addressed us in the
Begram
room allowed my compagnion to finish a photo first, before she kindly
explained that
there were unsolved copyright issues with the Kabul Museum.
There is something wrong here. I understand that the Afghan
archaeologists need money and want to guard their copyright, but the
museum ticket already contains one euro for the reconstruction of the
Museum of Kabul. It would have been better to double this sum and allow
people to take pictures. Their photos are probably the best guarantee
that more people will be interested. Copyright matters can never be an
excuse for
museums to disregard their first and foremost task: to enable visitors
to see objects. A museum that obstructs study, has something to explain. |
©
Marco Prins for
Livius.Org,
2006
Revision: 30 Dec. 2006 |
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