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On August 4, when a violent explosion destroyed part of Beirut and caused thousands of victims, the entire Lebanese cultural scene was also affected. Overview of damaged museums and art galleries.
It has now been two weeks to the day thata terrible explosion devastated the city of Beirut. In addition to the completely destroyed port area, a growing death toll and thousands of Lebanese without housing, several cultural venues in the capital have noted extensive damage, particularly among the works on display.
The Nicolas Ibrahim Sursock museum: a destroyed jewel
The Sursock Museum, jewels of Beirut and the city’s only modern art museum, is far from being spared. Opened in 1961, it goes through fifteen years of war, but on August 4, the explosion is unprecedented. The building and its magnificent facade of Venetian and Ottoman inspiration were completely blown away by the double explosion, there are no stained glass windows or windows, and more than twenty works are seriously damaged. Interviewed on France Inter, the director Zeina Arida expresses her dismay: “The breath has entered and left everywhere” she explains. “The first night was a terrible night because the building was completely open on all sides and the works were still inside.”
Gone in an instant… #Beirutblast https://t.co/bfI6LkQYbm
— Sursock Museum (@sursockmuseum) August 12, 2020
The next day, the museum teams are busy in the middle of the rubble to move and secure the collection. Volunteers also come to help them, moved. Among the works affected, a portrait of Nicolas Ibrahim Sursock, founder of the museum of modern art, produced by the Dutch painter Kees Van Dongen in 1930. The restorations will surely take a lot of time and money. The conservator, who is currently examining each work, estimates the necessary sum at several million dollars. After a renovation and extension of the building completed in 2015 which had already cost 13 million and in a climate of economic and political crisis, one can imagine the difficulties that lie ahead.
Galleries and exhibition spaces completely destroyed
Eager to instill a new multicultural and modern atmosphere, many gallery owners have settled in the vicinity of the port in recent years. Close to the heart of the explosion, the Marfa ‘and Artlab galleries were completely destroyed. The damage is also terrible at the Tanit gallery. The latter held, only a few days before the tragedy, the opening of an exhibition devoted to the Lebanese artist Abed Al Kadiri. The images he publishes on his Facebook page are edifying, fortunately the majority of his works are intact.
Founder and Director of Beirut Art Fair, Laure D’Hauteville testifies in The Art Newspaper of his concern about the resumption of cultural life in Beirut. “It will take a long time to rebuild the idea of an art fair in people’s minds after this,” she fears. Already postponed to 2021 due to the Covid-19 epidemic, the contemporary art fair it organizes takes place every year at the Seaside Arena, near the port, where everything has been destroyed. While the country is hit hard by the crisis, the Lebanese cultural scene seems to be in bad shape, far from seeing its activities resume anytime soon.
Government support seems, at a time of utopia. Joining Unesco’s appeal, the Center Pompidou and the Louvre have already announced their help in trying to save Lebanese cultural heritage. Beirut art galleries and artists also share ways to donate on their sites and social networks, supporting the idea of acting as quickly as possible to allow the conservation of many damaged masterpieces.
Together with the international heritage community, we support the Declaration of Solidarity with Lebanon and we support all efforts to rehabilitate the damaged cultural heritage of Beirut.
? https://t.co/Eruub7S1Fn#BeirutHeritage #BeirutBlast pic.twitter.com/jysyf2Ftzp– Louvre Museum (@MuseeLouvre) August 11, 2020
Visuel : Sursock Museum © Pjposullivan1
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