Technology gives stolen artefacts, lost histories new life at Dubai exhibition, but poses uncomfortable questions
- The provocative show, titled Phantom Limb, was held in the Jameel Arts Centre in Dubai and hosted work by 13 artists and collectives
- The often hard-hitting pieces point to the problematic infatuation with new technology to preserve sites and artefacts that have been lost, the curator says
Twenty-four intricate plastic replicas of Russian crown jewels pose uncomfortable questions about the theft of cultural and material heritage in war-torn societies.
Seeking to retain at least some of their ill-gotten wealth, the Marcos family took a number of the choicest artefacts in the Philippines with them when they ran, including pieces of jewellery that vanished from the Russian Tsar’s collection during the country’s 1918 civil war, and a much-coveteed 25-carat pink diamond, acquired during the dictator’s years of misrule in the Philippines.
The seized Russian jewellery is now kept in vaults at the Philippines Central Bank, where the pieces have been hidden from the public eye for more than three decades. But the plastic replicas of those mysterious pieces, created by London-based artists Pio Abad and Frances Wadsworth Jones using 3D printing technology, were on display in a long glass case at a recent art exhibition in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
The ghostly white replicas are part of an artwork titled The Collection of Jane Ryan & William Saunders – the names on the Swiss bank accounts opened by the Marcoses to conceal their purloined wealth.
The art was among pieces by 13 artists and collectives included in the Jameel Arts Centre’s recent provocative exhibition, titled Phantom Limb.