Iraq's imperiled modern art

If a blog about war seems an unlikely place to see photographs of paintings and sculptures, consider this. In May, the 5th Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment of the Third Infantry Division organized an art exhibition with a black-tie opening night in Dora, still one of Baghdad's most troubled neighborhoods, if less troubled than before. In Muthanna Province, the provincial reconstruction did something similar awhile back, commissioning paintings by Iraqi women that made their way to the State Department in Washington for a brief exhibition this spring. These exhibitions–while constrained by today's still-violent reality, the one in Dora having taken place on a military base–reflect the too-often overlooked fact that Iraq has deeply rooted artistic and cultural traditions largely eclipsed by the carnage and chaos of the last seven years, and desperately in need of revival. The sorry state of Iraq's struggling National Museum of Modern Art, which bears the scars of war, like most everything here, underscores the challenges faced by those trying to revive those traditions.