Dispute in Australia Over Dancing Shiva Statue's Rightful Place

THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD
By Andrew Taylor

Controversey surrounds ownership of Shiva two statues

AUSTRALIA---In the opaque world of art buying, one man's trash is another gallery's treasure. In this case, a 1000-year-old bronze statue of Shiva sold by the National Gallery of Australia to help purchase a larger Shiva from a disgraced antiquities dealer has turned up in the collection of one of the world's leading museums. The Dancing Shiva statue formerly owned by the Canberra gallery is now a prized item in the collection of the Louvre Abu Dhabi, featuring in its recent Birth of a Museum exhibition. If the pieces have been removed from India illegally, the NGA will be required to return them without compensation. The gallery's decision to increase its Indian art collection has been questioned by the Herald's art critic John McDonald. ''I wouldn't have thought the Australian public was desperate to see a massive collection of Indian artefacts in the ground floor galleries of the NGA, he said. ''Even Indians do not come to Canberra to view Indian art.... ''When they do, they are just as likely to feel indignant that these works have been removed from their rightful home.'' [link]