Colonial contexts

Übersee-Museum investigates the provenance of 18 Benin bronzes

In November, the Übersee-Museum in Bremen began conducting research into 18 items in its collection that originate from the former Kingdom of Benin in present-day Nigeria. Funded by the German Lost Art Foundation, the six-month project entitled “Research into the Provenance of 18 Objects from Benin” seeks to document chains of provenance and reveal possible contexts of injustice, thereby paving the way for potential restitutions to Nigeria. As project coordinator Dr. Jan Christoph Greim explains: “There are clear grounds for suspicion that some of the items are looted objects from the British punitive expedition of 1897.” The project findings are to be made publicly accessible in the central database of the Digital Benin initiative.

There are 18 ob­jects in the col­lec­tion of the Übersee-Mu­se­um Bre­men that are at­tributable to Benin. Three com­mem­o­ra­tive heads form part of the Africa ex­hi­bi­tion, while a cer­e­mo­ni­al staff is to be seen in the ex­hi­bi­tion Spuren­suche – Geschichte eines Mu­se­ums (“Trac­ing the Past – His­to­ry of a Mu­se­um”). An­oth­er sev­en frag­ments are on show in the mu­se­um’s dis­play de­pot. Ac­cord­ing to prove­nance re­searcher Bet­ti­na von Brisko­rn, who con­duct­ed pre­lim­i­nary in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to the ob­jects in the 1990s: “The prove­nance re­search is more com­plex than it might ap­pear at first sight here be­cause the source sit­u­a­tion is com­plex. Not all Benin ob­jects in Eu­ro­pean mu­se­um col­lec­tions to­day nec­es­sar­i­ly come from the British puni­tive ex­pe­di­tion of 1897. Some items may have left the coun­try pri­or to this; what is more, his­tor­i­cal mod­els were im­i­tat­ed af­ter the resur­gence of the art of bronze cast­ing in Benin.”

Nige­ria and Ger­many con­clud­ed a mu­se­um co­op­er­a­tion agree­ment on 13 Oc­to­ber 2021 stat­ing that the Benin Bronzes in Ger­man mu­se­ums are to be re­turned from 2022 on­wards. The de­tailed ar­range­ments for these resti­tu­tions are to be joint­ly elab­o­rat­ed in De­cem­ber 2021. In ad­di­tion, the two coun­tries are seek­ing to joint­ly es­tab­lish a broad-based col­lab­o­ra­tion in the field of mu­se­um ex­change, new mu­se­um con­struc­tion and ar­chae­ol­o­gy. It was al­so agreed that Benin Bronzes would con­tin­ue to be ex­hib­it­ed at Ger­man mu­se­ums and that col­lab­o­ra­tive work would be un­der­tak­en on ex­hi­bi­tion projects.