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Object Repatriation

 

Zahi Hawass Suggests New York Repatriate Cleopatra's Needle
By STAN PARCHIN
January 10, 2011

Cleopatra's Needle. Central Park, New York. Photograph provided by Flickr. 
 
In a highly anticipated move, Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities and Deputy Minister of Culture, recommended to New York City's mayor, Michael R. Bloomberg, that Central Park's ancient Egyptian obelisk, popularly known as Cleopatra's Needle, be repatriated. The monument's present state of deterioration prompted the suggestion by the world-renowned scholar, a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence.
 
Cleopatra's Needle, a 3,500-year-old stone obelisk that lies diagonally opposite Bloomberg's Manhattan townhouse, is in desperate need of preservation. A symbol of bureaucratic neglect for more than four decades, the badly weathered landmark languishes embarrassingly behind the property of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, home of the Western Hemisphere's greatest collection of Egyptian antiquities. The City of New York is solely responsible for the monument and its upkeep.

 

Taxpayers and others interested in the preservation of Cleopatra's Needle want answers to three important questions:

 

  • Why has the Central Park Conservancy, which employs actress Candice Bergen to advertise its accomplishments in restoration, ignored Cleopatra's Needle?

 

  • Why was Central Park South's Monument to Christopher Columbus cleaned while Cleopatra's Needle remains in a state of disrepair?

 

  • Why did the City of New York pay a small-scale Manhattan studio for recorded descriptions of Central Park attractions by Whoopi Goldberg and other celebrities when funds could have been better used for the more important conservation of Cleopatra's Needle?

 

Art Museum Journal strongly supports Dr. Hawass' efforts to return Cleopatra's Needle to Egypt if Mayor Bloomberg's administration refuses to finance the obelisk’s conservation and restoration. It also encourages the City of New York to give the monument and the ground on which it rests to The Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose scientists are capable of caring for the sculpture properly. After all, the institution continues to maintain the Temple of Dendur (visible from Central Park) since before its public debut in Summer 1978. 

 

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