Why would invaders bother sacking a museum? Where's the value in plundering art?
Explore the idea of art looting and destruction over time, and understand the significance of such assaults against culture.
"It's about power," says Humboldt State University's Julie Alderson in this episode of My Favorite Lecture. And while ISIS makes headlines for destroying religious symbols, Alderson scrupulously highlights a few ways conquerors control culture with art.
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But as you'll learn, it's not always a clean line between right and wrong. "Something changes, something's lost, something's gained... it's not always so straightforward that looting and destruction is a bad thing," she says.
And as you might guess, this is yet more visual radio from My Favorite Lecture. Feel free to peruse some of the visuals in the slideshow above.
My Favorite Lecture is a collaboration between KHSU, Arcata Main Street, and Humboldt State University.
Show Notes
- Thomas Kinkade official site
- History of the Pantheon
- Napoleon plunders the Vatican and The Treaty of Tolentino
- Horses from the Façade of San Marco
- Coricancha: Inca temple/imperial Spanish power play
- British imperial legacy and the art of Benin
- Palmyra before and after ISIS
- Picasso's Guernica
- Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA)
- Toppling the Saddam Hussein statue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JBi-ucxtwE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDu7bXqx8Ig