The Museum of Fantastic Arts Boston has returned two artworks to the Kingdom of Benin after 12 years in its assortment.
The switch was coordinated and facilitated by Dr. Arese Carrington, a member of the MFA’s Board of Advisors, who referred to as the occasion in an announcement “very vital.”
“These two artifacts are being returned to the true and correct proprietor and again to a spot the place they’ve each cultural and non secular worth,” she acknowledged.
The terracotta and iron Commemorative Head from the sixteenth or seventeenth century and a sixteenth–century bronze Reduction Plaque Exhibiting Two Officers with Raised Swords have been looted by British troopers throughout their assault on the historic Kingdom of Benin (present-day Benin Metropolis, Nigeria) in 1897.
In line with the museum, the provenance of the terracotta and iron sculpture may very well be traced to the London artwork market in 1899, “when it was offered by vendor William Cutter to a different vendor, William Downing Webster, together with different paintings looted from Benin.” The provenance of the Reduction Plaque may very well be traced straight again to the British forces who led the assault in 1897, and later the Crown Agent of the Niger Coast Protectorate who offered it in 1898.
Each objects have been bought by British archaeologist Augustus Pitt-Rivers for his namesake museum in Farnham, England, which closed within the Sixties, with its collections subsequently dispersed. Artwork collector Robert Owen Lehman Jr. (the son of the philanthropist and head of the Lehman Brothers funding financial institution) acquired the 2 works between the Sixties and Eighties whereas constructing his assortment of Benin Kingdom paintings. Lehman donated the Commemorative Head and the Reduction Plaque to the MFA Boston in 2013 and 2018.
The museum beforehand acknowledged that many objects within the Lehman Assortment, acquired “by means of buy at public public sale and from sellers, will be traced to the assault on Benin in 1897.”
On June 27, the Commemorative Head and the Reduction Plaque have been offered to His Royal Highness Prince Aghatise Erediauwa and H.E. Ambassador Samson Itegboje of the Embassy of Nigeria in a ceremony on the Nigeria Home in New York Metropolis.
“The Nationwide Fee for Museums and Monuments, working with the Embassy of Nigeria in Washington, D.C., will take possession of those two works and coordinate their dealing with, care, transit to Nigeria, and supply to the Oba of Benin,” acknowledged the museum.
The repatriation ceremony on June 27 was additionally attended by H.E. Ambassador Abubakar Jidda, Consul Common of Nigeria, New York; Matthew Teitelbaum, the MFA’s Ann and Graham Gund Director; Pierre Terjanian, the MFA’s Chief of Curatorial Affairs and Conservation; and Victoria Reed, the MFA’s Senior Curator for Provenance. Some members of the Benin group in New York have been additionally current to witness this return.
The MFA Boston closed its Benin Kingdom Gallery in April. The gallery had opened in 2013 after Lehman Jr. pledged to donate his assortment of West African works, together with 30 examples of Benin Bronzes, from the sixteenth to the 18th centuries over time, ensuing of their show within the museum. Nearly all the objects have been returned to Lehman Jr.
The museum additionally famous that three artworks donated by Lehman Jr. from the Benin Kingdom stay in its everlasting assortment, and mentioned the provenance of this stuff was inconclusive. “They are often traced to the European and American artwork markets within the second half of the twentieth century, and it isn’t recognized for sure when or how they left Benin. Analysis on these objects is ongoing.”
The 5 objects donated by Lehman Jr. have been beforehand scheduled to go on view in late June within the museum’s Artwork of Africa Gallery.
