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Month: February 2018

Why has the ethnographic museum run out of steam?

27. February 2018

by Philipp Schorch

Please allow me to begin with a Latourian digression to frame what I want to say about the current debates over ethnographic museums. “What has become of critique,” Bruno Latour asked almost fifteen years ago, “when an editorial in the New York Times contains the following quote?

Most scientists believe that [global] warming is caused largely by man-made pollutants that require strict regulation. Mr. Luntz [a Republican strategist] seems to acknowledge as much when he says that “the scientific debate is closing against us.” His advice, however, is to emphasize that the evidence is not complete.

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Parzinger’s misconceptions and misrepresentations of the restitution of African artefacts

21. February 2018

by Kwame Tua Opoku

“The restitution of those cultural objects which our museums and collections, directly or indirectly, possess thanks to the colonial system and are now being demanded, must also not be postponed with cheap arguments and tricks.”

Gert v. Paczensky and Herbert Ganslmayr, Nofretete will nach Hause. (1)

In an interview dated February 2018, Dr Herrmann Parzinger, repeating an idea of Neil MacGregor, former director of the British Museum and now a founding director of the Humboldt Forum, declares that we need new stories: There must be new stories. (Es muss neue Erzählungen geben.) (2) Like MacGregor, Parzinger is uncomfortable with the history of the looted African artefacts in Western museums and would like to tell a different history but knows that the history of Europeans’ violent attacks and robbery in Africa and Asia are too well established. He would like to tell stories with the African objects when they are moved to a new location. Note the choice of words: ‘stories’ and not ‘histories’. What never seems to occur to Western museum experts who want to tell the stories of others, especially Africans, is that Africans may want to tell their own histories with the objects now withheld from them. This appears inconceivable to many Westerners. Perhaps they think we have some irreparable congenital deficiencies that prevent us from telling our own histories.

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The Poisoned Museum

13. February 2018

by Ulrich van Loyen

Recevoir est reçu
The Edda/ M. Mauss

1
In an article in the 25 January issue of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the President of the Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Hermann Parzinger, took up Emmanuel Macron’s suggestion: artefacts that came to Europe in the colonial context should be exhibited in the site of their origin. In the shadow of France, the Prussian State Possessions, with its Prussian Palace – that vintage sarcophagus that does not hold the entire world as Hegel imagined, but nonetheless the Prussian-German relationship to the entire world, sees itself obligated to make an impressive international display. For of course what are required – alongside the gigantic, politically legitimized research funds to reconstruct proveniences, decipher handwritings, and ensure transparency vis-à-vis sponsors and the sovereign (digitalization) – are above all international framework conditions for the exhibitions so that the return of the exhibition objects can be regulated, together with the proper recipient – best identified by those carrying out the restitution; the recipient will also have to ensure the proper institution for and the proper treatment of the objects. Whether these are to be legally binding returns or merely loans seems to be secondary for Parzinger (which says a lot). For the example of sculptures from the royal house of Benin, Parzinger points out that it first must be considered who will get something back. And yes, it would be best for many, many people to consider this, all of Europe, because after all that’s where the objects are strewn. One could fear that the result could be a European pedagogical mission, in this case to the Nigerians, who for a start are called upon to show patience and understanding for the German mixture of barbarism and pedantry. The museums must be built and operated, and one wishes the state of Nigeria lots of fun thereby. But the hope – as can be glimpsed through the suggestions – is that somehow the museum could be the site where a riven nation could convalesce or an “imagined community” come together. As if what is to be returned was what will first produce those to whom it is returned. Along with the museum-ripe relationships to the rest of the world to which Germany wants to arrive, these are lovely prospects.

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Photographs and colonial history in the museum

6. February 2018

by Elizabeth Edwards

In Britain colonial history has, uncharacteristically, been headline news recently. This is not merely a post-Brexit vote sensitivity (well what is our history?), although this might be a deeply buried part of the narrative.  There are growing concerns about the visual conditions and public engagement with Britain’s colonial past. First were the demands from post-colonial activists that a statue of arch-imperialist Cecil Rhodes be removed from the street front of Oriel College Oxford (it wasn’t, but only after much debate), then a row over the renaming of the well-established public venue, the Colson Hall in Bristol, long named after local 18th century slave trader and city philanthropist, and then the row emanating a project entitled ’The Ethics of Empire’. This latter was initiated by an Oxford theologian, and called for a reappraisal of the balance between ‘good’ and ‘evil’ in the telling of colonial history and questioning dominance of, indeed assumption of, the latter in both historical debates and public representations within a multi-cultural society. This position brought letters to the press and a long and measured response from over sixty Oxford historians and anthropologists. These moments of protest and re-examination of the uncomfortable truths of British colonial history suddenly brought the debate into the public arena. But interestingly, no one discussed how that history might be engaged with in the public sphere beyond the removal of a statue – or not. Museums, as major vectors of public history and educative intent, have been largely absent from the debate, and the main UK sector magazine, The Museums Journal, strangely silent on the matter.

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Museum Collections in Motion – Programm

Museum Collections in Motion – Programm

Ein Artikel der digitalen Ausgabe der Süddeutschen Zeitung vom 09.07.2019

Museum Collections in Motion

Museum Collections in Motion

Museum Collections in Motion: Colonial and Postcolonial Encounters

International conference
July 15-17, 2019

A cooperation of
University of Cologne, Bremen University, the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum Cologne and boasblogs

Venue: Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum Cologne

Thematic Outline

The growing public awareness of colonial violence and historical injustice has put ethnographic collections into the spotlight of social and political debates. Museums are increasingly confronted with the challenge to decolonize their exhibition practices and examine their collection history for looted art, colonial entanglements, and systematic exclusions. The recent initiative of French President Macron to explore the modalities for restituting African objects from French collections has opened a new chapter in the debate on restitution and repatriation. While its actual implementation remains to be seen, the report by Felwine Sarr and Bénédicte Savoy has set a world-wide agenda for decolonizing museum collections and academic research in the coming years.
In order to envision alternative futures for these collections and new forms of co-operation, this conference brings together activists, curators, experts, young researchers and scholars from around the world. Over three days we will re-visit museum collections and the debates and practices that have evolved around them, discuss ongoing work in the longue durée of colonial and postcolonial encounters and bring views from the Global North and South into intensive dialogue.
Convenors: Anna Brus, Larissa Förster, Michi Knecht, Ulrike Lindner, Nanette Snoep, Martin Zillinger

© Jonathan Fine

Our Authors

Jonas Bens
Felicity Bodenstein
Rainer F. Buschmann
Silvy Chakkalakal
Claus Deimel
Steffi de Jong
Johanna Di Blasi
Hansjörg Dilger
Knut Ebeling
Elizabeth Edwards
Ethnologie-Studierende der Uni Bayreuth
Leonor Faber-Jonker
Christian Feest
Anujah Fernando
Callum Fisher
Larissa Förster
Sarah Fründt
Lilli Hasche
Rainer Hatoum
Paola Ivanov
Monica Juneja
Claudia Jürgens
Michi Knecht
Karl-Heinz Kohl
Viola König
Fritz W. Kramer
Christian Kravagna
Ingrid Kummels
Oliver Lueb
Barpougouni Mardjoua
Achille Mbembe
Mark Münzel
Kwame Tua Opoku
Glenn Penny (1) (2)
Martin Porr
Andrea Scholz
Philipp Schorch
Erhard Schüttpelz (1) (2) (3)
Sven Schütze
Anna Seiderer
Bernhard Streck
Z. S. Strother
Luísa Valentini
Sarah van Beurden
Ulrich van Loyen
Friedrich von Bose
Margareta von Oswald (1) (2)
Cordula Weißköppel (1) (2)
Souad Zeineddine (1) (2)

Recent Posts

  • Relocating of the Blog 5. August 2019
  • “Bringing home our Gods” 14. July 2019
  • Palace Museums in the Cameroon Grassfields: Sites of Inclusion, Exclusion, and Alienation 14. July 2019
  • Challenges of rewriting the Khomani San/Bushman archive at Iziko Museums of South Africa 13. July 2019
  • The Crisis of Anthropological Museums from the Perspective of an Anthropology of Museums, and some Remarks on the Agency of Restitution Conceived as a Restitution of Agency 13. July 2019

Selected Media Reports

For a detailed documentation of the media coverage please visit the CARMAH Media Review on Museums
–––

Melissa Stern: An Exhibition About a Book That Rejuvenated an Indigenous Culture
(Hyperallergic, 14.03.2019)
Gedenkraum für koloniales Unrecht im Humboldt Forum gefordert
(Monopol, 03.01.2019)
Unterm Strich: Die Debatte um geraubte Kulturgüter aus der Kolonialzeit nimmtweiter Fahrt auf.
Interviewausschnitte mit M. Grütters
(taz.de, 03.01.2019)
Jason Farago: Artwork Taken From Africa, Returning to a Home Transformed
(NYTimes.com, 03.01.2019)
Brigitta Hauser-Schäublin: Alles aus Frankreich muss zurück nach Afrika
(NZZ.ch, 31.12.2018)
Werner Bloch: „Wir wollenkeine Almosen“
(ZEIT.de, 27.12.2018)
„Gegen jeglichen Verkauf“. Die Ethnologin Viola König kritisiert den kulturellen Mißbrauch indigener Objekte.
Interview von Tobias Timm
(ZEIT.de, 18.12.2018)
Sebastian Frenzel: 265.000 Objekte, 0 Provenienzforscher.
Interview mit Barbara Plankensteiner
(Monopol, 18.12.2018)
Alexander Herman: The eye of the beholder: How we return art to its rightful place.
(The Globe and Mail, 30.11.2018)
Should looted colonial art be returned?
(Podcast, theartnewspaper.com, 14.12.2018)
Rebekka Habermas: Was schuldenwirkolonialen Objekten?
(Vortrag, Einsteinforum, 29.11.2018)
Alexander Herman: The eye of the beholder: How we return art to its rightful place.
(The Globe and Mail, 30.11.2018)
Felwine Sarr and Bénédicte Savoy: The Restitution of African Cultural Heritage. Toward a New Relational Ethics
Tristram Hunt, Hartmut Dorgerloh, Nicholas Thomas: Restitution Report: Museum directors respond
(The Art Newspaper, 27.11.2018)
BeninDialogueGroup: Museum für Kunst aus Benin geplant
(Stiftung Preussicher Kulturbesitz, 22.10.2018)
Catherine Hickley: Berlin’s Humboldt Forum: how its director plans to confront German colonial past
(The Art Newspaper, 17.10.2018)
Peer Teuwsen: Wir müssen nicht auf den nächsten Krieg warten, wir können die Sachen jetzt zurückgeben“. Interview with Bénédicte Savoy
(NZZ.de, 15.10.2018)
Peter Burghardt: ‚Zweckfrei fördern’.
(sueddeutsche.de, 14.10.2018)
Haroon Siddique: Not everything was looted’: British Museum to fight critics
(TheGuardian.com, 12.10.2018)
Graham Bowley: A new museum opens old wounds in Germany
(NewYorkTimes.com, 12.10.2018)
Jörg Häntzschel und Andreas Zielcke: Eine Räuberbande will Beweise. An interview with the lawyer Wolfgang Kaleck about the legal aspects of restitution.
(sueddeutsche.de, 11.10.2018)
Achilles Mbembe: Restitution ist nicht genug.
(FAZ.net, 09.10.2018)
Jörg Häntzschel: Aufbruch vertagt
(Süddeutsche.de, 21.09.2018)
Andreas Kilb: Wie kolonialistisch sind Naturkundemuseen?
(FAZ.net, 13.09.2018)
John Eligon: The Big Hole in Germany’s Nazi Reckoning? Its Colonial History
(NewYorkTimes.com, 11.09.2018)
Richard Dören: Wem gehört die Bibel von Hendrik Witbooi?
(FAZ.net, 06.09.2018)
Christoph Schmälzle: Ist das Kunst, oder muss das wieder weg?
(FAZ.net, 16.08.2018)
Karl-Heinz Kohl: So schnell restituieren die Preußen nicht
(FAZ.net, 17.05.2018)
Viola König: Zeigt endlich alles! Warum nur ein radikales Konzept das Humboldt Forum noch retten kann
(Zeit.de, 25.04.2018)
Jörg Häntzschel: Wie ein ethnologischer Kindergarten

(Süddeutsche Zeitung, 21.03.2018)
Cody Delistraty: The Fraught Future of the Ethnographic Museum
(frieze.com, 28.02.2018)
Casey Haughin: Why museum professionals need to talk about Black Panther
(The Hopkins Exhibitionist, 22.02.2018)
Nicola Kuhn: Berlins verfluchte Schätze

(Tagesspiegel.de, 13.02.2018)

Archives

  • August 2019 (1)
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  • December 2018 (3)
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