Sunday, January 2, 2011

Costa Ricans Can't Find Cash to Reclaim Artifacts

The Brooklyn Museum wants to transfer artifacts from Costa Rica back to that country, but Costa Rica, a relatively well-off Central American country, can't come up with the relatively modest (for these sorts of things) cash necessary for "postage and handling." See
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/01/arts/design/01costa.html?scp=1&sq=brooklyn%20museum&st=cse

Assuming the artifacts are ultimately repatriated, they will just go from one storage facility to another. Better in my opinion to sell them off for the benefit of the Brooklyn Museum and Costa Rican archaeology or to transfer them to Costa Rican community groups in the US to help immigrants stay in touch with their culture. An archaeologist made a similar suggestion that artifacts be tranferred to immigrant groups that made it into a MOU with El Salvador.
See http://culturalpropertyobserver.blogspot.com/2010/03/mou-with-el-salvador-extended.html

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