Last Thursday I attended a lecture given by Phillippe de Montebello (en)titled Encyclopedic Museum: Enlightened or Entitled? De Montebello, in a voice akin to Patrick Stewart doing his best Patrick Stewart impression, preached largely to the choir on the subject of the ethical debate involved in 'discovering', purchasing and showcasing antiquities in modern encyclopedic museums.

De Montebello began his lecture with a brief history of museums in general and the development of the concept of the 'encyclopedic' museum- one intended to showcase and explain virtually all the cultures of the world and their artifacts. (One imagines this stems from the same impulse for amounts of information so large as to be unprocessable that brought us the internet.) Mr. De Montebello, the former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, cited shows that he presided over at his museum to illustrate the educational and cultural benefits of exposure to these antiquities, notably the Year One exhibit which took place in the year 2000 at the Museum and included a glimpse at what the craftsmen and artists of cultures worldwide were producing at or around the time of the year 0.

De Montebello approaches his topic with a love and nostalgia for the encyclopedic museum that can hardly be faulted in a man who has spent his life advancing its cause. The Metropolitan did nothing but flourish under his guardianship, and as one who spent formative years within visiting distance of the Museum, I must (and do) thank him, deeply. In point of fact, I have very few qualms with the concept of the encyclopedic museum, either on personal, ethical or cultural levels. I agree with Mr. de Montebello's assertion that national museums - or other museums devoted to one narrow place, artist, time or cultural movement - do not permit the comparison necessary to fully understand the place that an object holds in the entire span of human cultural history. Museums such as the Metropolitan (and the Art Institute here in Chicago, where I attended his lecture) provide a certain kind of context that facilitates a deeper understanding of the works they show. At least historically.

The problem that keeps coming up for museums such as these is the pedigree of the works they choose to display. De Montebello repeatedly referenced a carving of the Code of Hammurabi which was originally carved in a country we now know as Iraq, but wound up buried beneath a country we now know as Iran for 3,000 years before being unearthed by Western excavations. Sadaam Hussein's request for the return of the piece to modern day Iraq provoked questions of who can really claim to be the cultural heir to such a piece. Does it belong to whatever country is now on top of the nation in which it was produced? Does it belong to the place where it has spent the most time (in this case, Iran) or to the country that financed the excavations which led to its (re)discovery? Do we need genetic testing to see which country is the most genetically tied to the Babylonian empire?

De Montebello poses these questions with only slightly less exaggeration and disdain than I. He is a humanist at heart, one who solidly feels that the ends justify the means. And when the ends are the cultural enrichment of the people of the world over the national pride of the people of one country, I am inclined to agree with him. But he makes another point, subtly. In the history of museums that began his lecture, de Montebello refers to museums not as a part of our way of life, but as a part of our urban way of life. He also makes several allusions to the idea that "to the victor go the spoils." The interesting twist on this debate is who that victor is, exactly. We are no longer talking about the ancient Romans raiding their Barbarian neighbors, or the Muslim artifacts taken as trophies in the crusades. This is not even a matter of the booty brought back to France by Napoleon, or the looting and raiding of museums during the military maneuvers in Iraq. The real victory here is one of class over class and culture over culture. While I am generally inclined to agree with Mr. de Montebello in his stand (at least in part due to my own love of seeing beautiful pieces) I do find it hard to avoid the fact that collecting is a game for the rich, and exoticism a passion of the bored. The hordes of young white Americans who flock to Buddhism, Rastafarianism, or even something as simple as backpacking through Europe are all examples (and I include myself among them) of those who seek out new cultural validity when they feel their own cultures have failed them. The difference is that thoughts can be absorbed and left to remain in the place where they originated. Objects, naturally, must be brought back. To the enlightened (or entitled) go the spoils.