A Benin Bronze in Berlin’s Ethnological Museum. Photo: Bin im Garten/Wikipedia Commons.
June 21, 2021 at 5:04pm
Following up on its promise earlier this year to return its trove of Benin bronzes to Nigeria, and to do so transparently, Germany has lifted the veil on a comprehensive digital database offering images and provenances of the looted artworks in its possession,
Artnews reports. The website, German Contact Points for Collections from Colonial Contexts, offers images and provenances for the objects and will continue to be updated as the repatriation process moves ahead.
The step is the latest taken by Germany, which has led its counterparts in the effort to return its share of the more than 90,000 brass, bronze, and ivory objects stolen by British soldiers in 1897 from the Republic of Benin (now Nigeria) and scattered across the Continent and throughout the world. Some five hundred of the purloined items are estimated to be held in the collection of Berlin’s Ethnologisches Museum at the Humboldt Forum, with still others in the possession of more than twenty other museums across the country.