British Museum loans statue from Elgin Marbles to Hermitage Museum

The British Museum has loaned out one of the Elgin Marbles to Russia’s State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, marking the first time the disputed artefact has left its London home since arriving over 200 years ago. Ownership over the 2,500-year-old marbles, which once stood as part of the Parthenon temple, is disputed by Greece, who maintains that the marbles were illegally removed by Lord Elgin in the 19th century during the Turkish occupation of Greece.

Neil MacGregor, director of the British Museum, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “This is the first time ever that the people of Russia have been able to see this great moment of European art and European thought.”

He added: “The trustees have always believed that such loans must continue between museums in spite of political disagreements between governments.”

Last month, lawyer Amal Clooney and Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras held talks as part of a campaign to have the Elgin Marbles returned to Greece from London, however Prime Minister David Cameron has held fast to his rejection of what he called “returnism”, despite claiming that the artefacts should be “properly shared with people around the world”.

The event has offered a surprising counterpoint to a marked decline in cultural relations between Russia and the west since the start of the Ukraine crisis. Last month, Hermitage director Mikhail Piotrovsky told RIA Novosti that the state of museum relations between Russia and the US are “worse today than during the Cold War”, urging for cultural links between both countries to remain strong.

The marble — a headless statue of the river god Ilissos — will be on display at the Hermitage until mid-January 2015.