Wed 12 October 2022:
One of the 31 culturally significant items that have been returned to the Nigerian government is a bronze sculpture of a West African king that was held in the collection of a Rhode Island museum for more than 70 years.
A ceremony at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, on Tuesday saw the transfer of several items, including the sculpture known as the Head of a King, or Oba, which was on display at the Rhode Island School of Design Museum (RISD).
The Benin Bronzes were stolen in 1897 when British colonial forces ransacked and looted the kingdom of Benin, which is now in modern-day Nigeria.
“In 1897 the ‘Head of an Oba’ was stolen from the Royal Palace of Oba Ovonranwmen,” RISD Museum Interim Director Sarah Ganz Blythe said in a statement.
“The RISD Museum has worked with the Nigerian National Commission for Museums and Monuments to repatriate this sculpture to the people of Nigeria where it belongs,” Blythe said.
The pieces that were stolen in the late 19th century included 29 that the Smithsonian Institution’s Board of Regents voted in June to return to Nigeria and one object from the National Gallery of Art, officials said.
“Through this repatriation, we acknowledge a legacy of cultural theft and do our part to return African culture to Africans.”
Today, we address a historic injustice by returning the Benin Bronzes, magnificent examples of Benin’s culture and history. Through this repatriation, we acknowledge a legacy of cultural theft and do our part to return African culture to Africans.
Shown here: bronze plaque. pic.twitter.com/E4vWQG8SFi
— Lonnie G. Bunch III (@SmithsonianSec) October 11, 2022
Abba Isa Tijani, director-general of Nigeria’s National Commission for Museums and Monuments, said she hoped the latest transfer would inspire other museums to return African artefacts.
“We hope for great collaborations with these museums and institutions and we have already opened promising discussions with them concerning this,” he said in a statement.
“The entire world is welcome to join in this new way of doing things. A way free from rancours and misgivings. A way filled with mutual respect.”
The Head of a King, which is believed to date to the 1700s, was given to the RISD Museum by Lucy Truman Aldrich in 1939. It had been acquired in a 1935 sale of objects from the Benin Kingdom from the Knoedler Gallery in New York, the museum said in a statement.
TWO OF NIGERIA’S LOOTED BENIN BRONZES RETURNED MORE THAN 100 YEARS LATER
A French customs stamp on the interior suggests it had been held in a French collection.
The interior bears a French customs stamp, indicating that it was once part of a French collection.
Despite not being able to link the sculpture to a particular French or British collection, the RISD Museum declared that it is almost certainly one of the looted artifacts.
An oba, or king, of the Edo people of Benin, West Africa, is represented by the bronze head. The sculptures were erected on ancestral altars in the royal palace, according to the museum, and were commissioned by a new king to honor a forerunner.
The return is a component of a global initiative by cultural institutions to get back artifacts that were taken during colonial wars.
GERMANY TRANSFER OWNERSHIP OF LOOTED BENIN BRONZES TO THE NIGERIA
Germany and Nigeria signed an agreement in August transferring ownership of the Benin Bronzes housed in German museums. The collection, which includes 512 items that arrived in Berlin as a result of the 1897 looting, has been called the most extensive transfer of museum artifacts from a colonial context to date.
In the same month, the Horniman Museum and Gardens in London declared it would give the Nigerian government a collection of 72 Benin Bronzes.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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