Our meeting was arranged almost by accident, or, to be more precise, because of a small mistake by Lord Ed Vaizey himself. A few months earlier, we\u2019d had a brief conversation about the Parthenon Sculptures and, thinking I was a member of the Parthenon Project \u2013 a nongovernmental organization dedicated to the campaign for their return to Greece \u2013 he made a note of my name and reached out recently with a practical question about his upcoming trip to Athens. I jumped at the chance, of course, and asked to meet.<\/p>\n
I found him lounging with his eyes closed on a sofa in the lobby of his Lagonisi hotel. I wasn\u2019t sure whether he was sleeping or just resting his eyes. \u201cHow do you stand this heat?\u201d he asked as we headed to the hotel\u2019s seaside restaurant. We sat at a table near the water. It was very hot, but the setting was idyllic nevertheless.<\/p>\n
\n\u2018The newspapers love it as an issue, and they can jump up and down and say I\u2019m selling Britain down the river, but most normal people are either not that interested or feel that it\u2019s the right thing to do\u2019<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Vaizey was in Athens for less than 24 hours to attend a panel discussion on the Parthenon Sculptures at a conference. As Britain\u2019s longest-serving culture minister (2010-2016), he had maintained a hard line against their return, insisting both on the historical framework of their acquisition and on the laws prohibiting the British Museum from returning objects from its collection. \u201cI\u2019ve now obviously done a complete 180, and I really can\u2019t think of any argument why they should remain at the British Museum,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
That about-face began in 2022 with an unexpected phone call from a public relations firm inviting him to visit the Acropolis. He asked for more information, and that was when he first heard the name John Lefas, a Greek expatriate industrialist who had funded the book \u201cWho Owns History?\u201d by barrister Geoffrey Robertson. In addition to sending hundreds of copies of the book to influential figures, Lefas was also organizing trips to Athens for members of the British elite. Thus, in August 2022, Lord Vaizey traveled to the Greek capital with his wife and visited the Parthenon for the first time. He arranged a meeting with Lefas when he returned to London. \u201cWe talked about his proposal, a solution that would benefit both sides, and I said I\u2019d like to help.\u201d Lefas immediately asked him if he\u2019d like to chair the Parthenon Project.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was tricky for me,\u201d Vaizey admits. \u201cOne reason is obviously that I\u2019m a trustee of the Tate. So, to effectively start telling another museum what you think they should do with their collection? It\u2019s pretty naughty. And the chair of the British Museum is George Osborne, who is my friend. So again, he doesn\u2019t want me telling him what to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
I ask whether he put the issue to the Tate\u2019s board. \u201cNo. If I had, I probably would have been told not to get involved. There was a point in time where the Department of Culture was going to tell me off and tell me to stop doing it, but I think, luckily for me, there were so many changes of prime minister and so many changes of ministers that the rude letter they were going to send me never got sent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vaizey became a peer after he left active politics. \u201cIt\u2019s a big honor. My wife becomes a lady and my kids are technically honorable, but my wife doesn\u2019t use the title. She hates it. But it is a huge honor because you get to sit in the House of Lords and you get to legislate. So, of all the honors, it is the most prestigious,\u201d he says, adding that the reason why he had to keep his visit to Athens so short was to return to London for a vote on the future of hereditary peers, an institution Labour wanted to abolish but his party, the Conservatives, wanted to keep. The House of Lords backed the move to block the expulsion of hereditary peers from the upper chamber.<\/p>\n
He also works with think tanks, consults with tech firms and has a weekly show on Times Radio. As a member of the Parthenon Project \u2013 which he now co-chairs with Baroness Thangam Debbonaire \u2013 he gives interviews and participates in debates, events and public discussions. The position, he notes, is pro bono. \u201cIt shouldn\u2019t be now that I think about it,\u201d he says in jest.<\/p>\n
I ask whether he has come under fire for his decision to join the campaign and publicly support the sculptures\u2019 return. \u201cThe newspapers love it as an issue, and they can jump up and down and say I\u2019m selling Britain down the river, but most normal people are either not that interested or feel that it\u2019s the right thing to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
Two months after assuming the chair of the Parthenon Project, Vaizey met with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in London. They had a drink in the private dining room of a Mayfair restaurant along with Lefas and other members of the Project. The connection was made when Lefas sent a copy of Robertson\u2019s book to the Greek Prime Minister\u2019s Office, opening a discreet channel of communication.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When Mitsotakis next visited London, in December 2023, Britain\u2019s then-prime minister, Rishi Sunak, canceled a scheduled meeting with the Greek prime minister in response to the latter\u2019s having spoken about the issue of the Parthenon Sculptures in an interview with the BBC. Vaizey asserts that there were other reasons why the meeting was canceled. \u201cI know that he was being advised by a very close friend of his, Oliver Dowden, who was a senior cabinet minister and who is very opposed to the marbles going back. I also suspect that the prime minister thought \u2013 it was close to coming up to an election and the government was unpopular \u2013 that even a small thing like being rude to the Greek prime minister about the marbles would be helpful and please the right wing. But I think most people actually saw it as slightly silly, unhelpful and rude.\u201d<\/p>\n
The political cost<\/p>\n
I remind Vaizey that when we had first met in October 2024 there was a lot of optimism in the Parthenon Project \u2013 mainly because of Labour\u2019s electoral victory \u2013 that a deal between Athens and the British Museum was close. Are they still optimistic? \u201cThis government is very unpopular right now. From a political point of view, on a cost-benefit analysis, most politicians will think, \u2018Is the pain worth the game?\u2019 So even if you agree that the sculptures should go back, do you want to go through it all. But if the British Museum does make a deal, this government won\u2019t intervene. They will say, \u2018Fine, we respect the decision of the British Museum.\u2019 Whereas the last government would say, \u2018No, no, no, we\u2019re going to pass emergency legislation.\u2019 So that hasn\u2019t changed. If you had a prime minister who just stood up tomorrow and said, \u2018It\u2019s so obvious the marbles should be reunited,\u2019 I would support any move by the British Museum to return the sculptures. Think the row would last 24 hours and then everyone would say, \u2018What was all the fuss about?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
He has occasionally commented that Greek benefactors could help fund the British Museum\u2019s massive renovation. I ask him whether these comments are a call to wealthy Greeks. \u201cNo,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s very unclear what would make a difference. My view is that they\u2019re going to be renovating the museum for the next 10 years and there will come a point when the marbles have to move. This is a perfect opportunity for Greece.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Parthenon Project\u2019s last event in London was attended, among others, by the Greek prime minister\u2019s wife, Mareva Grabowski-Mitsotakis. According to Vaizey, she spoke about the discussions that are currently under way \u2013 and have shown signs of progress \u2013 as well as the Greek side\u2019s proposal to offer, in exchange for the sculptures, ancient masterpieces on a loan basis. Vaizey has said that Agamemnon\u2019s gold funerary mask could be one such piece. Is this something that is officially on the table? \u201cThat\u2019s one that I understood would potentially be available. Something that could work well, something that almost has as much resonance in the world as the sculptures themselves, as a level of the quality that people would want to see.\u201d<\/p>\n
A new \u2018narrative\u2019<\/p>\n
On the ride to the airport \u2013 an opportunity for more conversation \u2013 Lord Vaizey speaks with enthusiasm about another issue: A reimagining of the British Museum\u2019s Greek collection. \u201cWe imagine a very sophisticated exhibition not only of classical artworks, but also a kind of telling the story of our relationship with Greece \u2013 Britain has a proud story to tell in terms of supporting Greek independence and at the same time, ancient Greece has had a profound influence on British culture. So you could tell that story in a reimagined British Museum with priceless Greek artifacts. It\u2019s long overdue. It\u2019s the perfect opportunity,\u201d he says, admitting that the idea actually belongs to Stephen Fry.<\/p>\n
\u201cStephen is my nemesis,\u201d he says of the popular and acclaimed British writer, actor and presenter, who is also a very active ally of the Parthenon Project. Just the previous day, says Vaizey, he was approached by a group of people who wanted to take a photograph with him and to thank him for the work he\u2019s been doing to raise the issue of the sculptures\u2019 return. \u201cI was flattered, of course \u2013 until one of the group looked at me and asked, \u2018You are Stephen Fry, right?\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Our meeting was arranged almost by accident, or, to be more precise, because of a small mistake by…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":118915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[648,1032,392,1033,171,70207,1149,74180,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-118914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-culture","11":"tag-design","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-in-depth","14":"tag-interviews","15":"tag-parthenon-sculptures","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114972096331091239","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}