mark frauenfelder of boingboing had a post about some equally awful paintings owned by saddam. i'm not sure if they are by the same artist. from the description, i think maybe not. here's the story mark linked to:

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/75594p-69826c.html

Here's a link to a similar story:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/features/story/0,11710,937088,00.html

What's wrong with the paintings? You can't go round telling the looters: "That painting you can destroy, but don't touch that one." If there is a principle, it is: "Don't destroy the expressive work of other people." Period.

It's groundbreakingly stupid. The losses are almost too deep to pronounce: the national library was burned (including "one of the oldest surviving copies of the Koran", " and handwritten records of the Ottoman empire) and exhibitions charting "the development of writing, abstract counting, the wheel and agriculture" are gone without a trace.

I recall Churchill successfully arguing that funding for the arts in Britain should be increased during WWII, because " that's what we're fighting for." I recall Lt Tim Collins of the Royal Irish Regiment telling his men they were entering the birthplace of Adam and Abraham, and should tread lightly. The Brits should have gone to Baghdad ahead of the Marines. Shoulda, woulda coulda

This is the result of a barbaric, belligerent, and profoundly ignorant crusade. We've demolished their history in order to change their government, inadvertantly destroyed the most complete record of the birth of human civilization. Not even the Taliban could have accomplished what we have. I'm beyond sick about it. It's a crime that never needed to happen, a crime of neglect, but against civilization itself.

I as well, am horrified, not just by the looting, but by the destruction of the artifacts and obliteration of their own history and heritage. I just don't get it. Why? Stealing priceless relics is one thing, but to smash them to pieces? What is gained? It's an interesting study of how people turn into animals after years of oppression and anger and destroy what they know and love. Take the LA riots for example. No one's looking, and we're mad, so let's burn down our neighborhood. "Hell. We're owed."

The end of history indeed. An almost equally significant loss was the Iraqi state archives. Vital historical research will never get done.

Down with the human heritage, up with kinky Velvet Elvis.

For many Iraqis, the Mesopotamian heritage had become virtually synonymous with the regime. Saddam, as other dictators (Mussolini, Franco, Nasser just a few examples) have, assumed the mantle of bygone glories as legitimation of his regime, which was touted as their restorer.

Although I wholeheartedly agree that this is a cultural tragedy beyond measure, perhaps we should see this as in some sense a knee jerk rejection of what the regime had stood for.

Hideous painting wanted back by artist,Rowena.

http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/5653803.htm

There's an extensive post about Saddam's "love shack" paintings here, on Teresa Nielsen Hayden's blog.

fwiw

While working on a website for an Archaeology organization, I ran into a recommended site:

http://cctr.umkc.edu/user/fdeblauwe/iraq.html

A compilation of readings, links, and commentaries regarding the current war in Iraq and Archaeology. It appears to be updated frequently. Worth a look if you're interested in this topic.

I can't even read about it, it makes me so sick. I saw a headline this morning about the cadre of experts that is being sent over in view of the museum's looting, but I couldn't read the article. Too late, too late.

What were the Marines guarding? The Oil Ministry.

"What were the Marines guarding? The Oil Ministry."

Exactly.

And reading Rumsfeld's comments about "bad things happen in life" (in the Post article) when referring to the looting came off, to me, as smug and inconsiderate. He wouldn't have been so flip about the oil wells.

What drives me to seethe about Rumsfeld is his fantasy of UNACCOUNTABILITY while he sits in GOVERNMENT. If he had said "Catastrophic things happened to the museums, libraries and archives when we went to war against these poor, half-crushed, angry people, and I shouldn't have let it happen, for their sake, because we knew better, knew where it was, never bombed it, and they couldn't possibly have been trusted with their own invaluable stuff during this chaos: I'm sorry", then I'd actually clap. But he's incapable of that kind of two-dimensional responsibility ( or do I mean remorse?)

And if this war plan was his or Tommy Franks', as he sometimes asserts, is a similar koan. He's smug and irresponsible whenever he smells a hard question, and the rest of the time he's a preening, Viagra-charged bully. He's a small man in a big chair.

The BBC has a slideshow of six of these paintings, too.

Looting, no plunder.

So what did you expect from a military invasion whose commander in chief is from an international crime family?

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