Arts/Literary
Revisting The Saga Of Stolen, Sale Of African Artefacts
Africa has always been known for its rich heritage and cultural value. While it was known as the land of “darkness” in the colonial times, the continent also had valuable cultural possessions, which were collected and have been placed in different museums around the world. The most common African artefacts reside in European and American museums with artefacts originating from predominantly the Belgian, French and British colonies which include West Africa, some parts of East Africa and the Middle belt. Here is a list of notable African art which has been removed from their homeland.
The Congolese Chokwe mask
The Tshokwe people (Chokwe) produced a great number of masks; the majority of them are painted in three basic colours and made from vegetable fibres, pieces of cloth and paper. The mask is located at the National Museum of African Art in Washington, carved by the Chokwe people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The most powerful and significant Chokwe mask is known as chikunga. The sacred mask is generally used during investiture ceremonies of a chief and sacrifices to the ancestors. The chief of the group can only wear the chikunga. The mukanda mask is another important mask used during male initiation in the mukanda institution, a process through which religion, art, and social organization are passed on from one generation to the next.
“Thousands of artifacts looted from African towns over a century ago line European and British Museums and institutions. After decades of campaigns for the return of African pieces, such as the Benin bronzes, the homecoming of looted artworks finally began looking like a real possibility”.
But in the middle of the global economic crisis sparked by the spread of the novel coronavirus, which has devastated economies, a new market for African artifacts and art has emerged.
Christie’s, the British auction house, announced a curated ”Arts of Africa, Oceania and North America” sale in Paris which includes African art such as the newly discovered Akan terracotta head (Ghana), Benin Bronze, and an Urhobo figure (Nigeria). The artifacts from all around Africa including Nigeria, Ghana, Gabon, and the Democratic Republic of Congo are valued from €30,000 to €900,000.
The Christie’s auction is embroiled in controversy. Christie’s can only guarantee the origin of the Bronze head as far back as 1890-1949 as a part of the Frederick Wolff-Knize collection that was shown in Vienna and New York.
Christie’s did not respond to a request for comment.
The Benin Bronze plaques that are offered by Christie’s are very similar to Bronze plaques from the St Petersburg and Berlin Museums; artworks with a well-documented history as part of looted artiefacts from the Royal Court in the invasion of Benin City in 1897.
Sotheby’s, the storied British-founded American auction house, on May 27 announced an ambitious sale of “The Clyman Fang Head,” a statue with an estimated value of between $2.5 million and $4 million, from the collection of Sidney and Bernice Clyman. A total of 32 African artworks from the collection will be offered across a series of auctions at Sotheby’s.
Auctions of valuable African artiefacts, some of which could be identified as candidates for repatriation to their lands of origin by activists, would be controversial in normal times but particularly so during the ongoing global pandemic and its attendant economic fallout.
Both Sotheby’s and Christie’s have moved auctions online for this reason. Sotheby’s said in March it has seen an expansion of interest in African art auctions with a more diverse customer base online.
Some have assumed auctions like these ones might dwindle after a high-profile report by Senegalese writer and economist Felwine Sarr and French historian Bénédicte Savoy called for thousands of African artworks in French museums taken during the colonial period to be returned to the continent.
The report, commissioned by French president Emmanuel Macron, called for a change in French law to allow the restitution of cultural works to Africa. In a meeting with students in Burkina Faso in 2017, Macron said ”Africa’s heritage must be showcased in Paris—but also in Dakar, in Lagos, in Cotonou. This will be one of my priorities. Starting, today and over the next five years, I want to move toward allowing for the temporary or definitive restitution of African cultural heritage to Africa.”
Plenty of African art is domiciled outside the continent, including statues and thrones, with hundreds of thousands of historical arteifacts housed in Belgium, the UK, Austria and Germany. The French report estimates the British Museum alone has a collection of around 69,000 works from Africa.
“Most of the artworks are already a part of global art conversation and the global economy and it needs to continue to do so,” says Kola Tubosun, a Nigerian linguist and Chevening research fellow at the British Library. “Many of [the artworks] influenced the way art was discussed in Europe in those days.
They present opportunities to celebrate global and not only African development.”
In 1897, British troops destroyed a large portion of Benin, a city in southern Nigeria burning the palace to the ground and looting 4,000 works of art including the famous Benin brass heads and bronzes. Today, the British Museum in London has about 700 Nigerian historical artiefacts with around 100 of them displayed in an underground gallery.
As the global clamour for repatriation of African artiefacts, including Benin’s, have come to the limelight, the British Museum has announced plans to “lend” some of the artworks to a proposed new museum in Benin City billed to open in 2021.
A part of the report stated that unless it could be proven that objects were obtained legitimately, they should be returned to Africa permanently, not on long-term loan. But one of the major criticisms of demands for the returns of artworks back to African countries especially Nigeria has been the general absence of museums and a proper maintenance culture.
While a few galleries and art shows are acting as custodians for African art in Nigeria, the older museums in the country are decrepit and generally underfunded. New museums are springing up in Africa, including Dakar, Senegal’s Museum of Black Civilizations and Lagos’ Yemisi Shyllon Museum of Art. But the museums are not enough.
The demand for the return of a lot of the artifacts has not only been sentimental. A few of the artifacts and art pieces are religious monuments and represent a dying segment of African culture. “Many of the taken works have ritual significance from the places they are taken,” says Tubosun. “When the owners of the art insist they want them [artworks] back in those places, it is their right to do so. But the ownership needs to be established.”
But the artiefacts are already a part of a global ecosystem that is seemingly moving on without Africa. For Prince Yemisi Shyllon, a Nigerian art collector, the value ascribed to many artiefacts taken from Africa exist because of their current location.
“There is a working industry and infrastructure to support the works of art. The moment those works come back to our control, they will lose value just like the ones that are here. The conversation moving forward should be to claim ownership and then claim annual royalties to these works of art even as they remain where they are,” says Shyllon.
Prince Shyllon believes that the Nigerian ecosystem for art isn’t where it should be yet especially as local attitudes towards historical artifacts are very often demonized.The museum named for him has been touted as a potential home for any African art pieces coming back home.
Additional reports from Beatrice Porbric
By: Jacob Obinna
It is the idea of God that family should exit. Children form part of the family. God loves family so much that Jesus was born into the family of Joseph.
Everyone’s family is good and important. Children should not look down on their family whether they are rich or poor.
Children should respect and honour their family and foster love among their siblings. They should work together and make peace in the family. They should always stand in the gap. It is good for family members to carry all along since everyone may not be doing well.
The Christianity that children learn is practised in family. Faith-based organisations do a great job in moulding children’s character. Those are the behaviours that children exhibit towards siblings in family.
Every child born in a family is there for a purpose. A baby born into a family is supplying something. It may be joy, wealth and so on. Everyone is important in a family.
Adolescents who have graduated from school but may not be contributing financially can do one or two things at home. You can engage in preparing meals at home while parents are away for a job or business. Contributing in house chores will go a long way to relieve parents of stress after a day’s job.
What do you contribute to your family, especially during holidays both in nuclear and extended family?
The family you were born is constant but friends are temporary. You can decide not to continue in friendship but you cannot cut off your family. No matter how bad you think your family is and you decide to leave home, you must surely return. Your friends can harbour you for a while.
The child’s first identity comes from the family. What the child learns first comes from the family.
Family is the centre of love and care. People have started playing down on marriage because of neglect on basics of family. Marriage starts today and and the next few months, it is threatened. Respect for family plays a crucial role in marriage.
No child grows without parental control and influence. If a child refuses to grow without taking instructions from parents, he may grow up being wild. There are consequences when children do not obey their parents. There are those who want to be rebellious against their parents. They should know that their length of days are tied to their parents.
Your bioligical parents know you more than every other person. There is the wisdom and knowledge your parents have that you do not so it is proper to listen to them before choosing carriers both in academics and job. A young man or woman can choose who to get married to, but a greater role in the choice of who to marry and the marriage proper comes from the parents.
They know what is best for you. No matter how modern trends will influence you and prove it wrong, parent is the key. No one can love you more than your parents because they are your blood.
A lot of parents have been traumatised due to the fact that children they nurtured and trained turned their back on them at older age. Children should not abandon their parents for any reason.
As you grow up, situations may arise in marriage when you decide it is over with your spouse, but no matter the level of provocation with your parents, they will not despise you. Parents will also play a role in that regard. Problem arises in every family but how it is handled matters a lot.
Some children honour their mentors more than their parents. Although there are parents who shy away from their responsibilities. It is important that parents take full responsibility of their children. You cannot bring a child to the planet earth and refuse to perform roles as a parent. But parents may not quantify what they spent from childhood to adolescence. That is a blessing children cannot get from another person.
There are people who have attributed their failure in life to the fact that their parents, especially mothers are witchcraft. It is wrong to feel that your mother is instrumental to your failure in life. The only way to success is hardwork.
Let money not determine the level of love for your parents. Wherever a child goes, family is constant.
Eunice Choko-Kayode
Naturally, when a child is born, it is the role of the father and mother to decide a suitable name for the child. The husband and wife normally discuss and suggest the English or vernacular name of the baby.
But sometimes, when a baby comes into a family, grandparents hearts are usually filled with joy to the extent that they want to answer present, by giving their own names not minding the fact that the biological parents have given theirs.
This happens mostly when the marriage is an inter-tribal one. It also happens even in intra-tribal marriage. Grandparents want equal representation as far as naming a child is concerned. They also have special names as a result of circumstances surrounding the birth of the child.
This is still happening till date.
A lot of people have viewed this in different ways but there is nothing wrong about it. The most important thing is that the child bears as many names as he or she can. But one thing is certain, the child must bear one name in school.
Should circumstance determine a child’s name?
Women who are more emotional are always eager to name their children considering the circumstances surrounding the child’s conception and arrival.
The issue of grandparents naming a child comes up mostly when it is the first of the family.
In naming children by some parents in the olden days, they named their children according to the days in the week in which they were born, like Sunday, Monday, Friday and so on.
You may be shocked to hear that whether a child is given 10 names by parents or grandparents, when he or she grows up, will decide to change. There are several cases where some persons decided to change especially when they feel that the names given by their parents and grandparents do not give them joy. If they are not doing well in life, they may claim that their misfortune is caused by the name their parents.
Competition among children in schools be it primary, (kindergarten) and secondary come in different forms. It can be Mathematics , debate, quiz, spelling bee,competition, from organisations like Cowbell, multi-national companies, faith-based organisations among others.
They are organised mostly for selected intelligent ones, the best among their peers to represent a class, school or group. Prizes are normally set aside for the best as well as consolation prizes for runners-up at the end of each session.
The question is, are children willing to accept defeat when they fail? As parents, guardians, can you encourage your children or wards to accept defeat instead of shouting and comparing them with others who may be performing better either in schools or outside.
Some parents may be blaming their children for not doing well in competitions. They will like to tell their children if others who may perform better have ten heads. Those group of parents blame their children for every failure.
For your children to do better in competition, the parents too must have emotional intelligence. When you continue to blame your children for failure, how intelligent are you?
Some parents always want their children to be in the 1st position and unhappy whenever they secure 2nd position. There were instances where children smashed their trophies because they never got the position they wanted to get and their parents supported them.
Children should be able to accept it whether they win or not. They should be encouraged for every performance. Discourage the issue of “shame, shame, shame, shame”.
A parent says she always tells her children to win even if they will fail. Always give them the mentality that they can win. Children should be given the impression that they can win prizes and laurels in every competition.
Parents should not isolate their children from others in the neighbourhood. Allow them to play with others. Don’t threaten your children that you may not pay their schools fees if they fail. Comparing them with others may encourage or discourage them.
Coming first or getting award as a first class student from the university sometimes does not mean that the person is the best. And if the child does not merit any award in the lower classes, does not mean that he can not merit first class also.
It should be noted that coming first in academic competition may not really mean that the competitor will be the best at work place or business.
Accepting defeat is a way to move higher. Even if a child who competed with others did not come first, there are consolation prizes for runners-up. When you advise the child to accept defeat, you are encouraging her to win in next competition.
Remember all children cannot be on the same knowledge level Their learning abilities defer.
Eunice Choko-Kayode
