Florence is leasing the Palazzo Vecchio, the Ponte Vecchio, the Piazza d'Ognisannti, the Belvedere... the list goes on and on. A lot of desperately needed money is being raised, although the inconvenience to residents (and presumably, also to visitors barred from these public spaces for the duration of the lease) is real and not inconsequential, unless the lease is during hours when the building or bridge would not be in use or normally closed.
The temporary privatizing of cultural space is not a new phenomenon. As I learned while researching the Brooklyn Museum controversy over the Chris Ofili Madonna (see my intro to the edited volume Unsettling 'Sensation' here), museums have been renting out their great halls for corporate and individual soirées -- not just gala fundraisers for the museum, but private functions -- for decades now.
Which raises the question: If Florence can lease its piazzas and museums their exhibition spaces to raise money needed to preserve their heritage, why can't museums lease antiquities from their storerooms to raise money needed to preserve archaeological sites?
The temporary privatizing of cultural space is not a new phenomenon. As I learned while researching the Brooklyn Museum controversy over the Chris Ofili Madonna (see my intro to the edited volume Unsettling 'Sensation' here), museums have been renting out their great halls for corporate and individual soirées -- not just gala fundraisers for the museum, but private functions -- for decades now.
Which raises the question: If Florence can lease its piazzas and museums their exhibition spaces to raise money needed to preserve their heritage, why can't museums lease antiquities from their storerooms to raise money needed to preserve archaeological sites?
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