The outstanding success of New York City’s ‘Silent Witnesses’ exhibition speaks for itself
It is April in New York, with the apple trees in bloom at the Lincoln Center, the Stars and Stripes waving from skyscrapers on Fifth Avenue, Broadway theaters packed once again and young people skating at the Rockefeller Center, surrounded by the flags of every country. Seven months after the double terrorist attack on the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers, the city has not forgotten but continues on with life, something which is law in such a major city, a crossroads for all the peoples of the world – and all its various interests. The visitors’ platform with the victims’ photographs – including 28 Greeks – which has acted as a cenotaph all this time, has been taken down. A floor in a nearby skyscraper has been made available for relatives of the victims to display the photographs of their loved ones. The official list of victims numbers 2,830 souls, but no one can be sure that there are not more. The last people to stand on the platform were the journalists and members of the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation, USA, along with Port City security officer Captain John Kassimatis, who hails from the island of Kythera and is the highest ranking Greek officer in New York. His unit was the first on the scene of the disaster. The men helped evacuate the towers, according to a plan that had been rehearsed beforehand. Otherwise many more lives would have been lost. Fortunately, the foundations under which the subway passed held firm. Captain Kassimatis lost his brother-in-law, Prokopis Zois, who worked at the American Express offices on the floor hit by one of the two aircraft. «He was vaporized, turning from flesh to spirit, but our grief is the same,» he said. It was Kassimatis who told us of the impending demolition of the platform. «It was decided that the lot will be entirely cleared for reconstruction,» he said without any trace of bitterness. In fact, Ground Zero no longer looks like a barren landscape but a construction site. New York is healing the wound inflicted by terrorists last September 11. «Silent Witnesses» – to the decision that life (whether economic, social or cultural) must go on – is the name of an exhibition of Early Bronze Age art from the Cyclades, including figurines and vases, organized and sponsored by the New York branch of the Onassis Foundation in cooperation with the Greek Ministry of Culture and curated by the archaeologist, Professor Christos Doumas, renowned for his excavations on the island of Santorini. With the approval of the J. Paul Getty Museum and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the most representative items from their collections were selected to go on show with 19 pieces, shown for the first time outside Greece, from the museums of Paros and Naxos. Others from the Goulandris Foundation have already been shown in New York. This time, the Greek artifacts are exhibited in their archaeological context, with photographs of the landscape and the graves in which they were found. Cycladic art is distinguished by rounded, anthropomorphic figures of men and women in the full flush of youth, without any sign of ugliness or aging. The female figurines display signs of pregnancy and there are votive offerings to Mother Earth to protect loved ones. The clean lines, the luster of the marble and the expressions on the human faces break through the boundaries of time. This is only the beginning of a period of welcome cooperation between American and Greek museums, according to the president of the Onassis Foundation and its New York branch, Stelios Papadimitriou. Alongside him was the executive director of the New York branch, Ambassador Loukas Tsilas, and the members of the board, Pavlos Ioannidis, Michael Sotirhos, Vassilis Vitsaxis and Professor George Babiniotis, among many other distinguished people. The exhibition was opened by Greek Culture Ministry Secretary-General Lina Mendoni and American Archbishop Demetrios at the Olympic Tower. Total turnover was 62.45 million euros on volume of 12 million shares. Losers beat winners 232 to 78 with 50 unchanged on 360 traded.(Reuters)
