Canonical Enfleshment and Enmeshment

By Kirsten Scheid, American University of Beirut:

Approaching art history’s as a toolkit for processes of becoming

In January 2013, a Beirut-based newspaper reported that restoration was to begin on one of the Louvre Museum’s “most iconic works,” the Victory of Samothrace. The report was, in fact, more than half a century late. Already in 1954 artist Moustapha Farroukhad restored it, not in the Louvre, but in an autobiographical novella published in Beirut and titled, Story of a Person from Lebanon. Before discussing the restoration,I want to consider why Farrouk labored so generously for this icon, and why I ungenerously took no photograph of his handiwork to prove his gift. This discussion interests me because I teach and write from Beirut, where most of my students graduate into the global precariate.