Eighteen-karat fancy brilliant diamond triple drop necklace. Estimate: $50,000-$/70,000. Cowan’s Auction image. CINCINNATI – Cowan’s Auctions Inc.’s second Fine Jewelry and Timepieces Auction will take place on Thursday, Sept. 27, beginning at 10 a.m. EDT. The 372-lot sale will be held at Cowan’s Auctions salesroom, and Internet live bidding will be provided by LiveAuctioneers.com.
The auction will include fine collections of signed and unsigned jewelry, timepieces, handbags and other couture. This auction will feature a broad selection of fine colored and white diamonds, pearls and precious stone jewelry.
Of special note are designer costume pieces from the collections of Carole Tanenbaum, author of Fabulous Fakes: A Passion for Vintage Costume Jewelry. Included are rare works by Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent, Moshino, Versace, Dior and Kenneth J. Lane, among others. Additionally, there will be numerous pieces of Ippolita fine jewelry, a high-end line that is a favorite of the stars of fashion, screen and stage.
Highlighted in the sale is an 18-karat white and fancy color diamond station drop pendant estimated at $50,000-$70,000. The pendant is composed of three fancy color round brilliant-cut diamonds and each diamond is encircled by white round brilliant cut diamonds.
A pair of 18-karat white and fancy yellow diamond drop earrings is estimated to bring $20,000-$25,000. The earrings are composed of three round brilliant-cut diamond stations and are set in 18-karat rose, yellow or white gold.
Rings and bracelets are also expected to perform well in the auction. A platinum and diamond ring containing a round, brilliant-cut, fancy light yellow diamond weighing approximately 4.5 carats is estimated at $38,000-$42,000. A Victorian hand-cast 18-karat bracelet with enamel is estimated at $3,500-$5,000.
A number of pieces by Italian designer Ippolita Ragosta will be offered in the auction. An Ippolita 18-karat diamond Constellation ring is estimated to bring $2,000-$3,000. A pair of Ippolita 18-karat diamond and green quartz drop earrings are expected to bring $800-$1,000, and an Ippolita multistone Bangle is expected to sell for $300-$500.
An Oscar De La Renta runway bib from the collection of Carole Tanenbaum, is estimated at $2,500-$3,500, is also featured in the sale. This is a grand scale runway bib necklace of gold tone leaf and flower forms with poured glass and rhinestone pave centers.
The auction will also feature a variety of items in the timepieces portion of the auction. Cowan’s will be offering an 18-karat man’s pocket watch, estimated at $2,000-$2,500. An Elgin National pocket watch no. 102 is estimated at $1,500-$2,000 and an Omega Flightmaster Chronograph watch is expected to bring $1,000-$1,200.
For details email Lea Lane at lea@cowans.com or phone Cowan’s at 513-871-1670.
Painting album, one of eight pages, China, ink and color on paper, attributed to Wang Hui (1632-1717), each depicting a landscape, bears signature, 14 1/2 x 12 inches. Estimate: $100,000-$150,000. Skinner Inc. image. BOSTON – Skinner Inc. will host an auction of Asian Works of Art on Sept. 21-22 in its Boston gallery. The market for fine Asian material continues to flourish, attracting international interest and record prices. With over 950 lots on offer, the Skinner auction features rare and important Chinese, Korean, and Japanese artwork and antiques.
LiveAuctioneers will provide Internet live bidding. Friday’s sale, which begins at 11 a.m. EDT, will consist of 431 lots. Saturday’s sale will also begin at 11 a.m. is composed of more than 550 lots.
An impressive group of jades highlights the sale. Among the selection of fine animal jades is a recumbent ox (lot 670, estimate: $80,000-$100,000), the stone of celadon color with pale pink, gray and deep green inclusions. An important mountain boulder (lot 728, $20,000-$25,000) is carved with pine trees and rocks from celadon stone with large russet inclusions. This jade comes from the collection of Lynn Perry Alstadt, founder of the American Bonsai Society. A fine, 19th century Guanyin (lot 696, $3,000-$5,000) with flowing robes and holding a lotus blossom is carved of translucent celadon stone. This Buddhist figure comes to Skinner from the private estate of a local New England family who purchased the piece in Europe.
The September sale features several hundred paintings. One particularly striking piece is a Chinese album of paintings (lot 295, $100,000-$150,000) attributed to Wang Hui (1632-1717). This eight-page album of landscapes was part of the same private collection, as the Guanyin, and has been in the family for 50 years.
A large, horizontal landscape (lot 270, $80,000-$100,000) is attributed to Zhang Daqian (1899-1983). Daqian, a contemporary artist, often painted in the older traditional styles, exemplified by this work. Both his traditional and contemporary paintings are in great demand.
A rare, blue and white charger from Iran dating to the 17th century (lot 791, $10,000-$15,000) is an example of one of the many exceptional works represented in the sale coming from outside of China. At over 21 inches in diameter, the large charger is decorated with a central image of freely painted pagodas, bridges, rocks and palm.
Originally from the collection of William Ball of Ball Mason jars comes a pair of rare 19th century tall Chinese porcelain vases with underglaze blue and enamel decoration of peacocks perched on rocks amidst peonies, chrysanthemums and other blossoms (lot 786, $40,000-$50,000).
A dozen notable lots of Peking glass are up for bid including a rectangular maroon and yellow snowflake bottle depicting a phoenix flying amid clouds with a lingzhi sprig in its beak and a dragon chasing a flaming pearl above rolling waves (lot 890, $2,000-$4,000). A baluster-shape vase with white and green overlay depicting a hunting scene (lot 891, $4,000-$6,000) and a Chinese export vase decorated with two vignettes showing figures at leisure in private courtyard scenes (lot 893, $4,000-$6,000) will also be offered.
The auction presents a fine offering of bronze mirrors, highlighted by a Chinese mirror from the Song Dynasty depicting a scene representing the story of Cei Fei, the dragon slayer (lot 499, $5,000-$7,000). These mirrors were intended to reflect a person’s inner qualities, rather than the outer appearance.
Painting album, one of eight pages, China, ink and color on paper, attributed to Wang Hui (1632-1717), each depicting a landscape, bears signature, 14 1/2 x 12 inches. Estimate: $100,000-$150,000. Skinner Inc. image.
Jade carving, China, 18th century, depicting a recumbent ox, celadon color with pale pink, gray, and deep green inclusions, 5 5/8 inches long. Estimate: $80,000-$100,000. Skinner Inc. image.
Jade boulder mountain, China, 19th century, in the shape of a horizontal mountain range with pine trees carved in relief on both sides, 11 1/8 inches. Estimate: $20,000-$25,000. Skinner Inc. image.
Peking Glass vase (center), China, 18th/19th century, maroon overlay carved through to a yellow snowflake ground, four-character Qianlong mark on recessed base, 8 1/4 inches high. Estimate: $2,000-$4,000. Peking Glass vase (right), 18th/19th century, baluster shape, white and green overlay carved through to a snowflake ground, four-character Qianlong mark on base, 9 1/8 inches high. Estimate: $4,000-$6,000. Skinner Inc. image.
Rare blue and white charger, Iran, Safavid dynasty, 17th century, painted in a vibrant cobalt blue with dark outlines, 21 3/8 inches in diameter. Estimate: $10,000-$15,000. Skinner Inc. image.
Rare pair of porcelain vases, China, 19th century, 24 1/4 inches high. Estimate: $40,000-$50,000. Skinner Inc. image.
Bronze mirror (far left), China, Song Dynasty (960-1279 A.D.), octofoil shape, 7 inches in diameter, with four other mirrors. Estimate: $5,000-$7,000. Skinner Inc. image.
PARIS, (AFP) – One of the world’s rarest collections of pre-Columbian art, estimated at some 20 million euros ($25.7 million), will go under the hammer next year in Paris, the Sotheby’s auction house said on Monday.
Amassed over the course of a century by a famed dynasty of French collectors, the Barbier-Muellers, some 300 artifacts from Mexico, Central and South America will go on sale on March 22 and 23.
From sculptures of wood or stone to ceramics, fabrics and ritual objects, the objects together offer a cross-section of Latin America’s major pre-Hispanic cultures.
Treasures up for grabs include an Aztec water goddess statue acquired by Josef Mueller in 1920 – the collector’s first major pre-Hispanic piece – or a human-shaped vase from the Brazilian island of Marajo, recently loaned to the British Museum.
Enriched over the years by Josef’s son-in-law Jean Paul Barbier-Mueller, the collection is on display in Paris until Sept. 17, heading to Hong Kong from Oct. 5-8, New York from Nov. 3-13 and finally to London.
Large Bear with Honey doorstop, 15 inches tall, est. $4,000-$6,000. Bertoia Auctions image.
VINELAND, N.J. – Collectors are counting the days till Bertoia Auctions lifts the lid on its 2,000-lot Sept. 21-23 Toybox Treasures sale, with Internet live bidding through LiveAuctioneers.com. From German tin windups and trains to cast-iron automotive, steam engines and pressed steel, this big three-day sale covers the entire spectrum of American and European toy production.
One of the sale’s anchor collections is that of the late Paul Ingersoll and his wife, Mimi. Bertoia Auctions associate Rich Bertoia described Paul as “a very popular collector and dealer who was very recognizable at East Coast auctions.” As the Ingersoll collection attests, Paul had a great eye for European autos and trains, as well as papier-mache and American tin toys.
Those who visited the Ingersolls’ Philadelphia home were left with an indelible impression. “Paul and Mimi loved displaying their toys as though they were decorative art. In their home it was impossible to focus on just one piece. Your eye would want to look all over,” said Bertoia. “There were early gameboards, antique cars, Christmas items, European aviation toys and nearly 100 trains. It was a treat to behold.”
The Ingersoll toys form a perfect partnership with the second headliner in the sale: a private collection of fine tinplate autos and magnificent trains and train stations.
The Friday, Sept. 21 session consists of cast-iron autos and a small selection of horse-drawn cast-iron toys, which then lead into mechanical and still banks, a very nice mix of cast-iron doorstops, and American tin toys.
The cast-iron toys are from a collector who was very particular about condition. “He collected according to how wet the paint was,” Bertoia said with a laugh, referring to the factory-fresh condition exhibited by many of the pieces. “This collector came into the hobby at a time when super-mint, like-new cast-iron toys were still available. His collection includes a very rare Arcade Checker Cab, a Hubley ‘Truk Mixer,’ and some classics from the Donald Kaufman collection – a Wilkens boat and Kenton coal truck.”
A small but very nice grouping of mechanical banks includes well-preserved examples of a Chief Big Moon, Magic bank (Ingersoll collection), Jumbo on Wheels, Nanny, and Bulldog Snapping. George Brown-type cottages are prized among the still banks.
The cast-iron section continues with an important figural doorstop collection. Featured pieces include a Bradley & Hubbard Whistling Jim, large full-figured Bear Holding Honey, large Bradley & Hubbard Owl, and several Art Deco Fish designs.
A beautiful array of American tin toys completes the Friday session. Highlights include a Fallows Fancy Notions van, an Express Wagon, Balancing Horse, Ives Rower and a very special little New York Paddlewheeler.
Saturday serves as a daylong showcase for the Ingersoll collection and begins with early French and German luxury autos and limos. Next up are fine trains. Several Marklins in large 1 gauge dominate the selection, together with a Marklin glass-canopied station, bridges, lamps and a fantastic array of deluxe accessories.
A fleet of boats from various consignors includes several rare and outstanding craft from the Ingersoll collection, such as a French-made Lefevre boat and three Bing productions: a liner, steam paddlewheeler and tugboat.
It will then be time for limos, early touring cars, coaches and carriages; and a small grouping of Paul Ingersoll’s biscuit tins. A Lefevre-Utile “LU” Tramway biscuit tin is appropriately accompanied by a Lefevre-Utile poster (from a different consignor) that depicts the actual tramway. The heart of the sale’s European character toys is formed by collector favorites from Martin and Lehmann (many boxed), two Santa cars with teddy bears, and French bisque dolls on cycles.
The Saturday session continues with part II of the 80-piece Klaus Grutzka steam engine collection, including a large dual-flywheel Marklin with dynamo, a very large-scale vertical boiler and other oversize machinist’s models. After the steam clears, it will be time for comic character toys. A parade of Disney Mickey Mouse toys will march shoulder to shoulder with Popeye favorites like Heavy Hitter and Brutus Dippy Dumper.
Around 100 different pressed-steel toys will close out day two, with choice vehicles by Buddy ‘L,’ Keystone, Structo and other top companies. A natural follow-up is the diverse grouping of pedal vehicles that shows off some of the best Gendron Packard productions ever to cruise into Bertoia’s gallery.
The Sunday, Sept. 23 session also features Schoenhut figures and wagons; 30+ games and a very special collection of 50 teddy bears and 50 teddy “go-alongs.” There are teddy-theme children’s books, Black Forest items; and teddy china and pottery. The centerpiece of this highly refined collection is the 8 or 9 original bear-theme drawings and sketches by Clifford Kennedy Berryman (American, 1869-1949), legendary Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist for the Washington Star.
“Many consider Berryman the most important illustrator and political cartoonist of our time. He’s best known as the artist who inspired the Teddy Roosevelt bear craze when he drew a series of Presidential cartoons featuring bears,” said Rich Bertoia. “The artworks in our sale are not just for teddy bear collectors; they’re also for fine art collectors.”
Paul Ingersoll’s skittles collection is next, followed by a colorful spread of Halloween antiques. There are jack-o-lanterns of many forms, hand-painted composition veggie people, and animal figures that were probably used as Halloween and Easter decorations. The Christmas spirit will be felt throughout the gallery as Bertoia’s presents belsnickles, Dresdens, annealed glass ornaments and wonderful display items, such as an Elastolin 4-tier Christmas pyramid table centerpiece.
The auction concludes with everyone’s favorite: holiday box lots available only to bidders in the room. “We call them surprise boxes, and they’re very popular with our regular customers,” said Bertoia’s owner, Jeanne Bertoia. “The boxes might contain die-cuts, ornaments of glass, scrap, tinsel or celluloid; putz villages, Santa figures – you name it. People actually wait to the end just to bid on these boxes, which we put together with great care and thought, as though we were filling Christmas stockings.”
Bertoia’s Toybox Treasures auction will start at 12 noon on Friday, Sept. 21; 9 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 22; and 10 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 23, 2012. To contact Bertoia Auctions call 856-692-1881 or e-mail toys@bertoiaauctions.com.
View the fully illustrated catalog and sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet at www.LiveAuctioneers.com.
Dante Gabriel Rossetti (English, 1828-1882), ‘The Beloved’ (‘The Bride’) 1865-6, oil on canvas, support: 825 x 762 mm frame: 1220 x 1110 x 83 mm. Purchased with assistance from Sir Arthur Du Cros Bt and Sir Otto Beit KCMG through the Art Fund 1916. Image courtesy of Tate London.
LONDON (AFP) – An exhibition celebrating the Pre-Raphaelite movement that shook up the Victorian art world is to open at London’s Tate Britain on Wednesday.
“Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde” will include masterpieces by the group’s founders — William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
The group formed in rebellion against the art establishment, and was inspired by the purity of early Renaissance painting and the natural world.
The Tate exhibition features well-known paintings including Millais’s “Ophelia,” “The Scapegoat” by Hunt, and Rossetti’s “Found” — rarely shown in Britain.
The Pre-Raphaelites were known for their use of vivid colours and exquisite detail, and their works are among the best known of all English paintings.
The exhibition is the largest collection of Pre-Raphaelite paintings since 1984 and traces the movement’s development from its formation in 1848 through to its Symbolist works of the 1890s.
Carol Jacobi, Tate’s curator of British Victorian art, is due to publish a paper claiming that Millais’s “Lorenzo” — one of the exhibition’s star attractions — contains a shadow deliberately shaped like a phallus.
“It’s an example of how incredibly innovative and courageous (the Pre-Raphaelites were),” she told The Times newspaper.
“It’s not about heterosexual sex,” she added. “It’s incredibly courageous to break so many rules.”
Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page are among those to have have loaned works for the show, which runs in London until January 15 before travelling to Washington, Tokyo and Moscow.
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ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
Dante Gabriel Rossetti (English, 1828-1882), ‘The Beloved’ (‘The Bride’) 1865-6, oil on canvas, support: 825 x 762 mm frame: 1220 x 1110 x 83 mm. Purchased with assistance from Sir Arthur Du Cros Bt and Sir Otto Beit KCMG through the Art Fund 1916. Image courtesy of Tate London.
The New Orleans Museum of Art was established in 1911. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic license.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) – The New Orleans Museum of Art reopened today after a cleanup necessitated by Hurricane Isaac.
Museum director Susan Taylor tells The Times-Picayune that water seeped into the museum’s administrative offices.
Except for the swampy basement, the museum suffered minimal damage from Isaac.
Some rain intruded through the sills of the plate glass windows around the café area and an ornamental plaster truss in the museum’s atrium was dampened by a leak.
But Taylor said no artwork was affected.
Power remained out at the building until Sept. 1, delaying the repairs. Generators provided emergency power during and after the storm, but weren’t powerful enough to provide the air-conditioning necessary to operate the museum, Taylor said. Power was restored earlier this week.
The Sydney and Walda Besthoff sculpture garden next to the museum suffered damage to foliage, but museum officials said artworks on display there were not damaged by the hurricane.
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Information from: The Times-Picayune, http://www.nola.com
Copyright 2012. Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-09-09-12 1735GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The New Orleans Museum of Art was established in 1911. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Generic license.
Headquarters of the Sanitary Commission at Gettsyburg, 1863, which includes an operating tent and an embalming tent. Image courtesy LiveAuctioneers.com Archive and Cowan’s Auctions Inc.
LANCASTER, Pa. (AP) – Re-enactor Richard Ryder has a macabre interest in the Civil War.
It’s one that allows him to recite facts such as, “President Abraham Lincoln’s body was embalmed multiple times as it was taken to various cities for public mourning after he was assassinated.”
Or to boast about having several authentic coffins, autopsy tools and an embalming table, all from the late 1800s.
“I’ve got the world’s most understanding wife,” said Ryder, a self-employed carpenter who lives in Mount Joy, Pa.
When the Manheim Township Historical Society decided it wanted to do something unusual to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, Ryder immediately came to the mind of John Snoke, the society’s vice president.
“He’s not your typical re-enactor,” Snoke said.
And so, dressed in period clothing and surrounded by period artifacts – not to mention a mannequin resting in a pine coffin with coins covering its eyes – Ryder spoke to a small crowd Saturday at Manheim Township Library about embalming and undertaking during the Civil War.
“The modern period for embalming in the United States started in 1861, which, obviously, was the start of our Civil War,” he said. “The embalming was experimental at best when it first started, because there were no rules, regulations or guidelines.”
Most soldiers killed in Civil War battles were simply buried in mass graves.
Embalming became popular among wealthy soldiers and officers, as their families sought to have the bodies of their deceased loved ones delivered home from the battlefields for burial.
“In order to do that, you had to preserve them in some fashion,” Ryder said.
Embalmers and undertakers traveled with the Union Army from battle to battle, so they were on hand as soldiers were killed.
The equipment needed for embalming was not readily available in the South, Ryder said. As a result, Confederate armies generally didn’t employ the practice.
It cost soldiers $25 and officers $50 to have their bodies embalmed. (Soldiers typically earned $13 a month in the army.)
They paid for the service in advance and had coupons sewn into their clothing so undertakers sifting through dead bodies would know which ones to pull out.
Undertakers collected the bodies of soldiers and prepared them for burial, while embalming surgeons exchanged a body’s natural fluids with a chemical stew.
Embalmers made their own preservation concoctions, which typically were cocktails of “arsenic, zinc chloride, mercury, salts of aluminum, sugar of lead and creosote,” Ryder said.
“There was a lot of trial and error before they found out what worked best,” Ryder said.
On average, it took about three gallons of embalming fluid to treat a full-grown man.
Ryder sets up his embalming and undertaking camp at Civil War reenactments all over the East Coast.
He started Civil War re-enacting – like most others involved in the hobby – as a soldier with the 50th Pennsylvania Regiment two decades ago.
But the married father of two soon discovered a troublesome rule about re-enacting.
“Women are not allowed in Union camps,” he said. “They could come in and visit, but they couldn’t stay.”
So if he wanted to go to reenactment camps with his wife, son and daughter, he was going to have to find a “civilian impression.”
As a builder, the cabinet-making aspect of undertaking suited Ryder.
“And I have a couple friends who are funeral directors,” he said.
Ryder began researching the role and gathering authentic artifacts to support the position.
Luck, he admits, has been on his side. Like the day he was walking the aisles at Renninger’s Antique Market in Adamstown, Pa., and spotted a wooden and wicker table-like piece of furniture, that was hinged in the middle so the upper half, which had a protruding headrest, could be raised and lowered.
It was advertised for sale as an “antique recliner.”
Technically, the furniture did function like a recliner. But no living person would have sat on it.
“I knew right away it was an embalming table from the late 1800s,” Ryder said. “The couple who sold it to me had no idea that’s what it was until I told them.”
He has a complete embalming surgeon’s kit that someone sold to a friend of Ryder’s who owns an antique shop in Mount Joy.
“My friend called me one day and said, ‘You have to come see what just walked into my store,’” Ryder said. “It was pretty amazing, because this stuff is hard to find.”
Ryder also owns four coffins from the Civil War era, including one lined with zinc, like the coffin Gen. John F. Reynolds arrived home to Lancaster in, after he was shot and killed July 1, 1863, on the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg.
“The only rule my wife has is I can’t keep the coffins in the house,” Ryder said. “If that’s all I have to do to enjoy this hobby, I can live with that.”
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Online:
http://bit.ly/TF3ViF
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Information from: Intelligencer Journal/Lancaster New Era, http://lancasteronline.com
Copyright 2012. Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-09-09-12 1824GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
Headquarters of the Sanitary Commission at Gettsyburg, 1863, which includes an operating tent and an embalming tent. Image courtesy LiveAuctioneers.com Archive and Cowan’s Auctions Inc.
The 12th-century Saladin Citadel in modern-day Cairo. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.
CAIRO (AP) – Egypt’s tour guides demonstrated Sunday, protesting that they are attacked by souvenir vendors and unlicensed competitors at famed sites like the Valley of the Kings tombs in Luxor or Cairo’s medieval citadel.
The turmoil reflects the crisis in Egypt’s vital tourism industry, which has suffered from the country’s internal unrest since the 2011 uprising that forced President Hosni Mubarak to step down.
Tourism officials said revenues and the number of tourists dropped by about a third in 2011. Official guides, unlicensed competitors and souvenir salesmen vie for the attention of small numbers of tourists – and the licensed operators have had enough.
About 150 tour guides demonstrated Sunday outside Cairo’s famed Egyptian Museum. They said the lack of security and increased lawlessness, which has plagued much of Egypt following the toppling of Mubarak, has exposed them to attacks from vendors and competitors and further complicates attempts to lure tourists back.
“There is no security. This is not a joke,” said Dina Yacoub, a 29-year-old guide who said she was punched in the face three times last month when an angry citizen tried to cut in line for a small train at the Cairo citadel and she protested. “We are asking tourists to come back … how would they unless there is security?”
Yacoub’s was one of at least 40 cases of assaults on tour guides reported to the professional union over the last year, said Gladys Haddad, a member of the union.
“Most of the assaults were basically fights over tourists,” she said, by vendors and unlicensed competitors breaking regulations and at times even damaging protected sites.
She said vendors are operating inside the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, in violation of antiquities laws that prevent even cameras from being brought into the tombs. In other areas, they have moved entrances into historic sites to ensure that tourists pass through their bazaars.
Haddad said some of the attacks were prompted by harassment of foreign tourists. When one guide objected, the vendor hit him in the head with a statue, causing a long gash, she said.
Tourism officials were not immediately available for comment.
Faten Abou Ali, a spokesman for the guides’ union, says Islamist President Mohammed Morsi’s new government is not paying attention to the industry.
“They are forgetting tourism. They are only talking about long-term projects,” Abou Ali, the deputy of the guide’s union, which has about 16,000 members. “Tourism … can bring in lots of cash. They need to open it up … They need to tell us, do they want tourism or not?”
Many worried that an Islamist-dominated government might put restrictions on tourism, such as banning alcohol or mixed beaches, and scare away tourists. Conflicting statements from members of Morsi’s party and other more radical Islamists about what is allowed and what is not caused concern.
During his first days in office, Morsi visited tourists sites in Luxor in an apparent message of reassurance.
Egypt has long coasts on the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, which have attracted visitors from Europe and U.S. because of their pristine beaches and beautiful diving sites.
“We work in the hospitality business. If we don’t have those tools than we should shut it and let tourists go to neighboring Israel and let her make all the money,” said Raji Banna, a 36-year old guide. “If Islamist groups and the current government don’t want to promote tourism, then tell us to go home.”
Copyright 2012. Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-WF-09-10-12 1244GMT
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The 12th-century Saladin Citadel in modern-day Cairo. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.
