Architecture and especially historical monuments or statues can often become implicated into war and cultural cleansing. Unfortunately, that usually means simply wiping them off the face of the earth in the misguided attempt to do the same to whatever culture they represent. The terror group ISIS is of course not above some good old fashioned destruction, and they have recently released a video of themselves destroying statues and relics from ancient and Islamic Mesopotamia at the Mosul Museum in Northern Iraq, as well as in the nearby walled city of Hatra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Video of ISIS destroying Mosul Museum. Naturally, the video elicited a response from the international art community. New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art denounced the pillaging in a statement, calling for an end to the "mindless attack on great art, on history, and on human understanding," and added that "such wanton brutality must stop, before all vestiges of the ancient world are obliterated." Like the Met, the Mosul Museum’s collection includes relics from the birth of civilization that are important not only to the history and culture of the region but also the world. The museum has some of the finest examples of sculptures ...
Architecture and especially historical monuments or statues can often become implicated into war and cultural cleansing. Unfortunately, that usually means simply wiping them off the face of the earth in the misguided attempt to do the same to whatever culture they represent. The terror group ISIS is of course not above some good old fashioned destruction, and they have recently released a video of themselves destroying statues and relics from ancient and Islamic Mesopotamia at the Mosul Museum in Northern Iraq, as well as in the nearby walled city of Hatra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Video of ISIS destroying Mosul Museum. Naturally, the video elicited a response from the international art community. New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art denounced the pillaging in a statement, calling for an end to the "mindless attack on great art, on history, and on human understanding," and added that "such wanton brutality must stop, before all vestiges of the ancient world are obliterated." Like the Met, the Mosul Museum’s collection includes relics from the birth of civilization that are important not only to the history and culture of the region but also the world. The museum has some of the finest examples of sculptures ...