Advance apologies to anyone attracted by the headline and expecting a serious, weighty piece on the Elgin marbles, preservation of historic art or the repatriation of disputed works.
One of my guilty TV pleasure’s is ITV’s Dickinson’s Real Deal, a sort of Antiques Roadshow meets Cash in the Attic where members of the pubic queue up to sell their family heirlooms for a few quid to dealers or, in the case of the wary and greedy, in a local auction.
Uncharitable people would describe a lot of the items on the show as tat but as much of it has been passed down the generations I find myself shouting in the direction of the TV at people’s willingness to sell off items their parents and grandparents have obviously enjoyed and cared for.
Some of the dealers remind me of the spiv in Dad’s Army, taking the pursuit of a good deal to new depths. Viewers have the benefit of being able to see an onscreen independent valuation of the item up for grabs, and it’s not unusual to see a dealer offering a few twenties for something valued in the hundreds.
Acting as the honest broker, Dickinson will step in and stop the seller agreeing to a bad deal, and more than once he’s taken the dealer aside after they’ve struck a deal and insisted they hand over a bit more cash.
But what really makes me hurl the cushions at the screen is the spectacle of people told their attractive, 100 year old item isn’t worth much because of some microscopic scratch which is hardly noticeable even with the benefit of a TV camera on high zoom.
Which takes us back to the headline, I suspect that if the curator of the British Museum took the marbles on the show, some wide boy dealer would claim there’s too much damage for them to worth much but, because the seller is a nice chap he’s prepared to offer £20.
If you’ve not yet caught up with Dickinson’s latest TV exploits set your video for ITV1 weekdays at 4pm. If, on the other hand, you still want some information on the marbles, visit britishmuseum.org
I trust Dickinson’s Real Deal vendors have more right to sell their items than Elgin did the Marbles.
ahhh the good old BBC encouraging us all to sell off our precious heirlooms that our parents and grandparents have lovingly preserved for years. Got to love public service broadcasting!
If the so called “Elgin Marbles” had been left in Greece they would be in a better condition then they are now. Just compare what is left in Athens to what the British Museum holds!The British Museum destroyed the Marbles (which where sliced and brought to Great Britain by Elgin in order to be “protected” ,decorating his villa -House) ,in attempt to make them look “cleaner” -”whiter” .
If the so called “Elgin Marbles” had been left in Greece they would be in a better condition then they are now. Just compare what is left in Athens to what the British Museum holds!The British Museum destroyed the Marbles (which where sliced and brought to Great Britain by Elgin in order to be “protected” ,decorating his villa -House) ,in an attempt to make them look “cleaner” -”whiter” .
They should be back in Greece now that they’ve got the facilities. Hell, they probably should have been left there in the first place, although I don’t think historical preservation was the first thing on anyone’s mind in 1807, especially the Turks, who were running the Greece show back then. The British should realize it’s time to return the marbles to the place they’ll shine brightest.