Every city throughout the United States has been impacted by the recent economic recession. The combined forces of the credit crisis and the foreclosure crisis led to plummeting home prices in every region of the country. The ripples were felt from San Francisco condos to homes for sale. However, some metropolitan areas were able to avoid the worst of the turmoil and are now emerging from the mess faster than the rest of the country.
The recovery is swiftest in those areas that didn’t have as much of a housing price run up to begin with, either because the economy in those areas has stayed healthy or the economy has been limited for decades and residents have adapted or left. The top recovering areas also had lower rates of sub-prime and negative amortization loans financed in the years leading up to and during the crash.
In December of 2009, Forbes Magazine released a list of the number of loans that were foreclosed upon in the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the United States. Forbes then calculated the percentage of loans that were descending into further delinquency versus those that were improving.
For example, the number of foreclosed homes in Austin was examined to see which loans continued towards the path of complete default versus those which inched their way back towards normalcy. The lower the rate of deterioration was for a given area, the higher their corresponding ranking with regard to recovery.
Here are the cities that fared best by that measurement and are recovering the most quickly:
1. Harrisburg-Carlisle, Pa. 2. Austin-Round Rock, Texas 3. Ogden-Clearfield, Utah 4. Buffalo, NY 5. Knoxville, Tennessee
Source: Forbes, Francesca Levy (12/09/2009)
The Pennsylvania region of Harrisburg, and the Austin area of Texas were rated the best, followed by Ogden, Utah and Buffalo, NY. The homes seem to be recovering quite well as that region came in fifth in the study.
Top 5 Recovering Real Estate Markets in the U.S., 7 out of 10 [based on 512 votes]
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New Fine Arts Center becomes the first public building constructed in a small Texas city for last thirty years. Local artists and active workers, parents and teachers, historians and collectors of national creativity participated in center building. All of them thought over what should be their place for public meetings
Hi-tech Audience
Project by Kell Muñoz Architects is almost 2000 sq.m., a hall 975 places and an audience completed with the hi-tech audio-visual equipment. The project budget has been limited enough, $5.7 million dollars. This building of time declaring a multicultural modernism, traditional for district (Rio Grande Valley), mixed with the international modernism associating with Mexico.
Art Center in Texas
To allocate a new public place, the construction facade has been raised. The front composition from the bright vertical strips organized according to a color spectrum, very brightly allocates a building in a silent and harmonious landscape.
Hirshhorn Museum soon will cardinally change appearance, and without especial and cardinal changes. The New York architects from bureau Diller Scofidio + Renfro will add an existing complex with two easy structures in the form of blue spheres which will allow a museum to open additional spaces during a season. The sphere on a roof precisely reminds eggs on a museum of El Salvador of the Distance.
The Unusual Museum in Washington
In one of spheres the audience on 1,000 visual places will take places. Through transparent walls of a sphere spectators can enjoy not only a show, but also possibility to peep for the visitors of a museum walking on galleries. In the friend, a smaller sphere on the size there will be a cafe.
Estimated cost of realization of 5 million dollars, now the project is in a stage of study of the concept. Under plans, pavilions will open in 2011 year. However, if statements Fine Arts Commission) be required and National Capital Planning Commission, realization will be postponed for couple of years.
Two pavilions which should become a tribute of memory Daniel Burnham which will note 100-year-old anniversary, have opened in Millennium Park (Chicago). Designers — two modern legends: Ben van Berkel and Zaha Hadid. Though, pavilion Zaha Hadid has been left unfinished, but pavilion opening even in a semikind has received the good criticism: “the Aluminium design of pavilion bewitches, to crowd has very much liked”, — has told Sallie Gaines, the press-secretary of action.
Burnham Pavilions by Ben van Berkel & Zaha Hadid
Expecting pavilion Zaha Hadid opening, it is possible to receive now already aesthetic pleasure from the second work, pavilion Ben van Berkel. It consists of two parallel panels, a roof and a floor, connected by three support. The pavilion will be highlighted especially at night.
To receive the maximum impressions, you need to walk very quickly on pavilion.
The building for company T Bailey Inc is made as factory expansion on manufacture of steel pipes. The architect of the project — Tom Kundig from studio Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects — used huge pipes as a design element.
We Make the Pipes!
Total area of office of 1,100 sq. m. For construction of office architects used directly that product which is made by the customer. Visitors will get to a building on huge pipes. In a huge vertical pipe the large fan which will condition air at the main office is placed. The conditioner will be charged by energy of the sun.
The interior corresponds to stylistics. The concrete floor, open structure, a covering minimum. The roof inclination will direct streams of rain water to a garden, for watering of trees growing there.
Bar in Las Vegas, work of the Japanese studio “Design Spirits Co., Ltd” became one of winners of competition The Great Indoors Awards. The Chinese restaurant is in one building with very large casino and hotel on 3,300 apartments.
Luxury Relax & Consume
The project has won a nomination “Relax and Consume”. Walls and a ceiling are covered by a white openwork pattern from a steel.
Habitual registration of an interior — division into various zones by means of various "samples". In the given premise there is one magnificent feature — an absolute openness, absence of columns. Designers have decided to use this fact and have issued all interior in uniform style. The space has turned out unique and picturesque.
Each skyscraper in Chicago is continuation of History of Skyscrapers which has begun for a city in 1885 with building Home Insurance Building. "Tower" in height of 42 meters (plus two floors have been completed in 1891, having finished height to 50 meters) became the first-ever building exceeding level in five floors. New Aqua Tower — height of 250 meters, the sculptural facade of a structure creating illusion of waves is unique.
The Unique Architectural Structure
Calcareous rocks, characteristic for area of Great Lakes became a prototype of a wavy facade. Such architectural decision it has not only visual value, and is functional; waves are used as viewing platforms, and also a shadow veil. Building parameters; 82 floors, 250 meters in height, 215 hotel rooms (with 1 on 18 floor), 476 apartments (with 19 on 52 floor), 5,100 sq. m. trading and office areas, an underground parking, a 8-storeyed cellar a total area of 32,000 sq. m., a terrace with gardens, pools, arbors, paths for walks and run.
The Uptic Studios designed a country house in the Northern Idaho. To large family for three generations was necessary modern residence for all of its members. And now — this dream is real! The beautiful nature around was taken as a starting point in the design, each room is the emphasis placed on the panoramic view from the window. The windows in the floor, terraces and natural materials make all for harmony in a house.
Dream House in Idaho, 9 out of 10 [based on 293 votes]
This mansion was designed by Peter Cohan Architect in 2008 and built in Seattle, Washington, USA. The house located in an area with high rainfall, it's formed by two concrete walls and a sloping roof, directing rainwater to three tanks for storage and subsequent use in the home.
Smart House in Seattle, state of Washington, 7 out of 10 [based on 360 votes]
The private residence «Cat Mountain» designed by Cornerstone Architects, located in Austin, Texas, USA. The architects restored the original house and added to it an impressive annex, the owner also worked independently on the design of the interior. The residence blends harmoniously with the natural environment, and sustainable design elements of the project are added respectability.
The Harmonious Residence in the U.S., state of Texas, 7 out of 10 [based on 261 votes]
Elegant mansion was presented by the James D. LaRue Architects in Austin, Texas, USA. Interior of the residence is designed as a harmonious mix of modern style for comfort and convenience. Spacious rooms with large windows and plenty of natural light, and the possible way out of the living room to the terrace with a covered sitting area and a swimming pool.
Mansion in Austin, 9 out of 10 [based on 145 votes]
The 18th century Spanish-built San Antonio Missions in Texas in the United States, including Alamo, were awarded world heritage status by the UN's cultural body on Sunday.The Alamo, in San Antonio, Texas, has been awarded World Heritage status [Credit: Mark Harris/Getty Images]
UNESCO's World Heritage Committee approved the listing of the five Spanish Roman Catholic sites built in and around what is now the city of San Antonio, including the Alamo fort, where in 1836 some 180 Texans fighting for independence from Mexico fought to the death against Mexican General Santa Anna's army of several thousand soldiers.
The site comprises architectural and archaeological structures, farmland, residencies, churches and granaries, as well as water distribution systems, UNESCO said.
The complexes "illustrate the Spanish Crown's efforts to colonize, evangelize and defend the northern frontier of New Spain," UNESCO said.
It said the San Antonio Missions were also an example of the interweaving of Spanish and Coahuiltecan cultures, including the decorative elements of churches, which combined Catholic symbols with indigenous designs inspired by nature.
A stolen bronze Indian religious relic worth an estimated $1 million was recovered Wednesday by federal customs agents as part of a continuing investigation into a former New York-based art dealer.The item recovered this week is a Chola-period bronze representing a Tamil poet and saint that dates to the 11th or 12th centuries [Credit: John Taggart/The Wall Street Journal
The dealer, Subhash Kapoor, is now awaiting trial in India for allegedly looting artifacts worth tens of millions of dollars.
Mr. Kapoor operated a now-defunct gallery on the Upper East Side called Art of the Past. Prosecutors allege that between 1995 and 2012 he illegally imported and sold stolen antiquities from India, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere, often using forged documents to pass the items off as legitimate.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations unit and the Manhattan district attorney’s office have together recovered more than 2,500 artifacts worth more than $100 million from the gallery and storage facilities in and around New York City.
Kenneth J. Kaplan, a lawyer in New York representing Mr. Kapoor, declined to comment Wednesday, but said his client had asserted his innocence both to him and to his counsel in India. Mr. Kapoor has not yet entered a plea in India, according to a spokeswoman for Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.
The item recovered this week is a Chola-period bronze representing a Tamil poet and saint that dates to the 11th or 12th centuries, according to Brenton Easter, a special agent with Homeland Security Investigations. The statue, which stands nearly two feet tall and weighs more than 80 pounds, was allegedly looted about a decade ago from a temple in a village in the southeastern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
The theft of the figure was “completely devastating” to the villagers, Mr. Easter said on Wednesday afternoon, as he stood by the open door of the van containing the relic parked on East 91st Street near Park Avenue. The item was smuggled into the U.S. labeled as a handicraft, and then offered for sale at Mr. Kapoor’s gallery on Madison Avenue.
In recent months some institutions that purchased objects from Mr. Kapoor have surrendered the items to Homeland Security Investigations. They include the Honolulu Museum of Art and the Peabody Essex Museum in Massachusetts.
In a statement, Honolulu Museum Director Stephan Jost said in April that “clearly the museum could have done better” with its past vetting of objects. Dan L. Monroe, the Peabody Essex Museum director, said in a statement that month that the institution has undertaken “a rigorous internal assessment of its collection and is working in full cooperation with the Department of Homeland Security.”
This time around, the stolen object was voluntarily surrendered by an anonymous collector who had been contacted by investigators about the piece. Officials said the buyer was considered a victim because the statue was accompanied by a false provenance, or ownership history, that predated its theft.
“We commend this collector for his conscious decision to return this stolen idol,” said Raymond R. Parmer, Jr., special agent in charge of HSI New York. “We hope that other collectors, institutions and museums will continue to partner with HSI, and to see this surrender as a successful way to move forward when dealing with artifacts that might be of concern.”
The agency has recovered at least six other sacred Chola bronzes that it anticipates repatriating to the Indian government.
In April, the Manhattan district attorney’s office filed papers in New York State Supreme Court seeking the forfeiture of 2,622 items seized from the gallery and storage units in Manhattan, Queens and Long Island. The items were worth $107 million, according to the summons. Among them: a statue from India valued at $15 million, a large bronze statue from Cambodia or Thailand worth $5 million and a large standing Buddha from North India estimated at $7.5 million.
According to the April summons, Mr. Kapoor and his gallery manager, Aaron Freedman, “engaged in a common plan and scheme to illegally obtain and sell stolen items of art and conceal or disguise the nature, source and ownership of the illegally obtained property.”
Mr. Freedman pleaded guilty in December 2013 to five counts of criminal possession of stolen property and one count of conspiracy, according to the summons. Prosecutors said the antiquities were forfeitable from Mr. Kapoor and his gallery as proceeds and/or instrumentalities of crime.
Author: Jennifer Smith | Source: The Wall Street Journal [July 03, 2015]
Tucked away among northwestern New Mexico's sandstone cliffs and buttes are the remnants of an ancient civilization whose monumental architecture and cultural influences have been a source of mystery for years.Pueblo Bonito ruins, Chaco Canyon [Credit: Scott Haefner]
Scholars and curious visitors have spent more than a century trying to unravel those mysteries and more work needs to be done.
That's why nearly 30 top archaeologists from universities and organizations around the nation called on the U.S. Interior Department on Tuesday to protect the area surrounding Chaco Culture National Historical Park from oil and gas development.
In a letter to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, they talked about the countless hours they've spent in the field, the dozens of books they've published about the Chaco society and their decades of collective experience studying its connection to modern Native American tribes in the Southwest. They call Chaco a distinct resource.
"Many of the features associated with this landscape — the communications and road systems that once linked the canyon to great house sites located as far away as southeast Utah and which are still being identified to this day — have been damaged by the construction of oil and gas roads, pipelines and well pads," the archaeologists said.
They're pushing for the agency to consider a master leasing plan that would take into account cultural resources beyond the boundaries of the national park. They're also looking for more coordination between federal land managers, tribes and archaeologists.
The Bureau of Land Management is revamping its resource management plan for the San Juan Basin and all new leasing within a 10-mile radius of Chaco park has been deferred until the plan is updated, likely in 2016.
Tourists cast their shadows on the ancient Anasazi ruins of Chaco Canyon [Credit: AP/Eric Draper]
Wally Drangmeister, a spokesman for the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association, said the BLM's existing plan already takes into account cultural resources. He said there has been a push by environmentalists to tie Chaco to development in the Mancos shale more than 10 miles from the park.
Environmentalists have been calling for protections for the greater Chaco area, and Drangmeister said that expansive definition could put the whole San Juan Basin off limits.
The basin is one of the largest natural gas fields in the U.S. and has been in production for more than 60 years. More development is expected in some areas since technology is making it easier for energy companies to tap the region's oil resources.
Some archaeologists have theorized that Chaco's influence spread far and wide from its remote desert location. A World Heritage site, Chaco includes a series of great houses, or massive multistory stone buildings, some of which were oriented to solar and lunar directions and offered lines of sight between buildings to allow for communication.
Steve Lekson, a professor and curator at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History, has spent years studying Chaco and its influence over the Southwest. He likened the process to learning how to play baseball after discovering home base and the pitcher's mound.
"You keep poking around and find more bases and the warning tracks and all that stuff. You need the whole picture to understand how the game is played," he said. "Of course, Chaco being a political system or major regional system is much more complicated than baseball. You need enough of the package intact so you can actually understand the structure of the thing."
Chris Farthing of England takes a picture of the Chaco Canyon ruins [Credit: Jeff Geissler/Associated Press]
Lekson and others said the hope that there's more to be discovered doesn't mean energy development should come to a halt.
"I don't think anybody is saying that, but we need to pay a lot of attention to how that's done and be cognizant of the larger issue," he said. "It shouldn't be a site-by-site thing."
The archaeologists' letter comes on the heels of a tour of the Chaco area by U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, D-New Mexico, and Interior Deputy Secretary Mike Connor. The two met with land managers and others after the tour.
Connor said there are Navajo allottees who want to develop their resources and other Native Americans who want to protect those resources.
"It's a balancing act throughout all of BLM's lands and I think Chaco is particularly unique," he said. "The more I learn about it, the more I was struck by the more we all have to learn."
Author: Susan Montoya Bryan | Source: The Associated Press [July 01, 2015]
Archaeologists say climate change is destroying the historical record of the Arctic people. The artefacts being received by the University of Alaska Fairbanks’s Museum of the North are more deteriorated than those unearthed decades ago, curator and professor Josh Reuther told KUAC, and he attributes that to the changing climate.A wooden mask recovered from the Nunalleq archaeological site in western Alaska [Credit: University of Aberdeen]
The problem isn’t just being noticed by academics in museums — archaeologists have seen changes in the field.
“It’s kind of a whole series of problems coming together at the same time to sort of create a perfect storm,” said Max Friesen, a University of Toronto archaeologist working on a dig in Canada’s Northwest Territories.
From left, UA Museum of the North Archaeology Curator Josh Reuther and Kaktovik resident Marie Rexford examine ivory and bone artifacts in the Barter Island collection [Credit: Kelsey Gobroski/UA Museum of the North]
“You have the potential melting of the permafrost, you have sea level rise, you have in some cases changing weather patterns.”
Friesen said he’s alarmed by the rapid deterioration. Until recently, he said, organic artefacts made of materials like wood or animal hides, were abundant around the region because they were preserved by permafrost or silty soils.
“It’s a very rich data base that’s being lost all across the Arctic,” he said.
The interest around the ancient Greek tomb of Amphipolis may have decreased dramatically over the last months, however, the “brand name” created during the excavations and thanks to the mystery regarding the dead who were buried in Kasta hill, still manages to attract attention across Europe and the United States.Clay figurines of the God Attis from the 2nd century BC which originate, according to Sotheby's House, from Amphipolis [Credit: Sotheby's]
The experienced auction house Sotheby’s did not let the opportunity go to waste and around a week ago they put six clay figurines on sale. The figurines depict the ancient Greek god Attis, the adolescent consort of Kybele, who was self-castrated to escape her jealousy. The terracotta dates back to the 2nd century BC and according to the auction house, it originated from Amphipolis.
“This cannot be confirmed,” noted Greek Alternate Culture Minister Nikos Xydakis, on the occasion of the repatriation of the illegally exported Hermes statue head, which was set for sale by Bohnams. The alternate minister’s statement was confirmed by an experienced archaeologist, who believes that the figurines are not characteristic of Amphipolis and therefore there is no reason for their connection with the region.
Experts might not find any connection to the Amphipolis tomb, however, the fact that Sotherby’s sold the six terracotta figurines for $8,750 shows that the public is still fascinated by the discovery of the ancient Greek monument.
An exquisitely sculpted ancient bust of a woman from Palmyra, Syria, is returned to view for the first time since 2006 at the Smithsonian's Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. Named "Haliphat," it will be accompanied by images of 18th-century engravings and 19th-century photographs of ancient Palmyra selected from the Freer|Sackler Libraries and Archives. A newly created 3-D scan of the bust will also be released for viewing and download at a later date as part of the Smithsonian X 3D Collection.Funerary Bust from Palmyra, Syria, 231 BC [Credit: Smithsonian's Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery]
Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is one of the most important archaeological sites in the Near East, and one of the best preserved city-states in the world.
"In the face of current tragic upheavals in Iraq and Syria, every stone, arch and carved relief plays a greater historical and cultural role than it has in the past," said Julian Raby, the Dame Jillian Sackler Director of the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery and Freer Gallery of Art. "Like the relief of Haliphat, each stone can remind a people of its past, and fashion identity both individually and collectively."
Once lush, wealthy and cosmopolitan, Palmyra ("the city of palms") was an oasis in the desert at the hub of trade between the Mediterranean, Mesopotamia, ancient Iran and Southeast Asia. Two millennia ago, its inhabitants constructed monumental colonnades, temples, a theater and elaborate tomb complexes, a significant amount of which survives today.
Dating from 231 AD, the limestone funerary relief sculpture depicts an elegant, bejeweled figure with both Roman and Aramaic artistic influences, reinforcing Palmyra's status between the Eastern and Western worlds.
The accompanying photographs were taken 1867-1876 by prolific photographer Fèlix Bonfils and provide the most complete visual record of Palmyra from the 19th century.
The engraving images are from Robert Woods' 1753 The Ruins of Palmyra, a publication that inspired the popular neoclassical architecture style in Britain and North America. Its image of an "Eagle Decorating an Ancient Roman Temple" was the model for the image on the seal of the United States, and its depictions of Palmyra's coffered ceilings shaped the ceiling of the north entrance of the Freer Gallery of Art.
The display will be on view indefinitely.
Source: Smithsonian's Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery [June 09, 2015]
The United States on Tuesday officially returned 25 artifacts looted over the decades from Italy, including Etruscan vases, 1st-century frescoes and precious books that ended up in U.S. museums, universities and private collections.A third century B.C. terracotta head, left, and a second century Roman bronze figure representing Mars, are shown during a press conference in Rome, Tuesday, May 26, 2015 [Credit: AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino]
Italy has been on a campaign to recover looted artifacts, using the courts and public shaming to compel museums and collectors to return them, and has won back several important pieces.
A first century B.C. fresco taken from Pompeii is displayed during a press conference in Rome, Tuesday, May 26, 2015 [Credit: AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino]
The items returned Tuesday were either spontaneously turned over to U.S. authorities or seized by police after investigators noticed them in Christie's and Sotheby's auction catalogues, gallery listings, or as a result of customs searches, court cases or tips. One 17th-century Venetian cannon was seized by Boston border patrol agents as it was being smuggled from Egypt to the U.S. inside construction equipment, police said.
A Carabinieri Italian paramilitary police officer stands next to ancient artifacts returned to Italy by The United States, on display in a Rome Carabinieri barracks, Tuesday, May 26, 2015 [Credit: AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino]
U.S. Ambassador John Phillips joined Italy's carabinieri art police to show off the haul. It included Etruscan vases from the Toledo Museum of Art and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 17th-century botany books from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, and a manuscript from the 1500s stolen from the Turin archdiocese in 1990 that ended up listed in the University of South Florida's special collections.
"Italy is blessed with a rich cultural legacy and therefore cursed to suffer the pillaging of important cultural artifacts," Phillips said, adding that Interpol estimates the illicit trade in cultural heritage produces more than $9 billion in profits each year.
An ancient Etruscan 'Kalpis', a vase dated 500 B.C., right, is displayed during a press conference in Rome, Tuesday, May 26, 2015 [Credit: AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino]
Police said several of the items were allegedly sold by Italian dealers Giacomo Medici and Gianfranco Becchina, both convicted of trafficking in plundered Roman artifacts. After the objects were recovered, Italian authorities confirmed their provenance.
A detail of the lid of a second century Roman marble sarcophagus, representing a woman, is seen as it's displayed during a press conference in Rome, Tuesday, May 26, 2015 [Credit: AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino]
Police stressed that most collectors and museums willingly gave up the artifacts after learning they had been stolen. The Minneapolis museum director contacted the Italian culture ministry after reading an article about one suspect piece, police said.
An Italian Carabiniere paramilitary police officer stands next to an uncredited first century fresco, displayed during a press conference in Rome, Tuesday, May 26, 2015 [Credit: AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino]
Phillips praised the collaboration between Italy's police and U.S. Homeland Security and border patrol agents. He also said the U.S. had returned more than 7,600 objects to over 30 countries and foreign citizens since 2007.
A statue of the Hindu monkey god Hanuman, which was looted from the Koh Ker temple complex in Preah Vihear province, was returned to Cambodia on Sunday after spending 33 years in the possession of the Cleveland Museum of Art in the U.S.A closeup of the Hanuman statue returned early Monday U.S. time to Cambodia by the Cleveland Museum of Art [Credit: Cleveland Museum of Art]
Prak Sunnara, director-general of the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts’ heritage department, confirmed Sunday that the statue was set to arrive last night at the Phnom Penh International Airport.
“The statue will arrive at 8:30 tonight and this statue was made in the 10th-century Koh Ker style,” he said. “It has been returned from the U.S.”
He declined to comment further, noting that an official press conference about the statue would be held at the Council of Ministers on Tuesday.
According to the Cleveland Museum of Art’s website, the 10th-century sandstone sculpture stands about 116 cm tall and 54 cm wide and depicts the god in a crouching position, with the body of a man and head of a monkey.
Anne Lemaistre, head of the U.N. cultural agency UNESCO in Cambodia, said it was clear the statue had originally been attached to a base, but it wasn’t until archaeologists unearthed previously undiscovered pedestals in the Koh Ker complex’s Prasat Chen temple last year that the statue’s exact location was determined.
“I think the proof has been established that it is coming from that place, because it was a matter of matching the pedestal with the sculpture,” Ms. Lemaistre said, referring to Prasat Chen.
“UNESCO is extremely satisfied and very grateful to the Cleveland museum for accepting to give it back,” she added.
Kong Vireak, director of the National Museum in Phnom Penh, said the statue would be handed over on Monday to the museum, where it will be displayed.
In May last year, Cleveland’s The Plain Dealer newspaper reported that Sonya Rhie Quintanilla, the Cleveland museum’s curator of Indian and Southeast Asian art, traveled to Cambodia several months earlier to attempt to determine whether the statue came from Prasat Chen.
“Our work on the piece and its provenance is still underway, and terribly time-consuming, but so far, based on my extensive fieldwork in Cambodia earlier this year, I can report that I did not find any physical evidence to confirm that the Cleveland Hanuman is from Prasat Chen,” the newspaper quoted Ms. Quintanilla as saying at the time.
Neither Ms. Quintanilla nor Caroline Guscott, the museum’s spokeswoman, immediately responded to requests for comment.
Ms. Lemaistre of UNESCO said that while she did not know what had motivated the museum to give back the statue, it would have been premature to ask for its return before the additional pedestals in the temple were discovered last year.
“I think we could not have really asked without having established the evidence,” she said.
Authors: Mech Dara and Chris Mueller | Source: The Cambodia Daily [May 11, 2015]
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