Irving Finkel

sharply about what religion has done to us and where we might have been without it.

Because not having religion does not mean not having law or morality or sensitivity or consideration or love or any of those things.

None of those things depends on religion.

and those are the things which are important so i think it's um people say oh you say this because you work there and you know you're a curator you would say that that the british museum is a special place it's nothing to do with that it is actually a special place because you cannot point to another museum in the world with the same task for example the louvre is basically a museum of

art, basically a museum of art, not a museum of ideas.

And the Met is definitely a museum of art.

It's called the museum of art.

And that's their priority, design and colour and shape.

To us, to my mind, it's the British Museum.

This is one factor among many others.

And we are not an art museum.

We're not a local museum.

We're not a museum of the history of the bicycle.

We're not a celebration of evil.

We are, as it were, doing, as I see it, the best we could do if, for example, a whole load of Martians arrived in the Great Court.

burst through the front door and said to us um tell us all about this place tell us about the world can you do it fast because we got to leave and if you took them round and said look at this look at this look at this look at this they'd get some picture which wasn't insane the only thing they wouldn't get is a recording of johnny be good by chuck berry but apparently one's been put into space

This is a very comforting thing.

Precisely so.

And it's not a valid criticism to say to us that most of the stuff is not on exhibition, which is what everybody says.

It should go there, it should go there, because it's not on exhibition.