30.10.2024
Ethnologisches Museum
Ritual objects belonging to the Kogi people are being returned to Colombia: the Ethnologisches Museum of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin is stepping up its cooperation with Colombia’s ICANH (Instituto Colombiano de Antropología e Historia) and the country’s Indigenous Kogi community. In 2023, the SPK restituted two Kogi masks to Colombia. Now, three additional artefacts of great ritual significance that are associated with the masks are being sent to Colombia on loan in an effort to reinforce the two countries’ mutual exchange regarding the objects and to pave the way for their planned restitution. In addition to this, historical audio recordings captured in the 19th century will be researched in a collaborative effort between the two institutions.
The artefacts in question originate from the Indigenous Kogi (also known as Kogui) community of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in northern Colombia and were acquired for the museum by Konrad Theodor Preuss in 1915 during a research trip. The objects have a history of ritual use and continue to hold considerable spiritual significance for the Kogi to this day.
The SPK had already been in dialogue with representatives of the ICANH (Instituto Colombiano de Antropología e Historia) and the Indigenous organisation Gonavindúa Tayrona for a number of years before Colombia ultimately made an official request for the masks to be returned. The objects were handed over in June 2023 in the course of Colombian President Gustavo Petro Urrego’s visit to German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
At the request of the Kogi, the Ethnologisches Museum subsequently conducted further research into the three objects, which have now been transported to Colombia in the hope of determining their significance. The objects in question are a staff, a headdress and a basket, all of which appear to have been used in the same ritual context as and in combination with the masks. As such, both parties are committed to ensuring their restitution. The SMB’s loaning of the objects will form the foundation for further research to be carried out on site in cooperation with the ICANH and the Kogi. A formal transfer of ownership is also due to take place once the SPK’s Foundation Board has granted its approval.
In addition to the three artefacts, the SPK’s Colombian partners will also be provided with digital copies of the audio recordings made by Preuss at several locations throughout Colombia, along with all other relevant documentation. Preuss’s historical audio recordings will be processed in collaboration with the Kogi within the context of the proposed research trip to be conducted by a representative from the Ethnologisches Museum.
The audio collection comprises a total of 17 recordings, each with a duration of roughly three minutes, with their precise content and attribution to be analysed in detail. Furthermore, additional objects from the Preuss collection are currently being readied for collaborative research, which will centre around contexts of acquisition and reactivating knowledge pertaining to how the objects in question were produced and used.
The artefacts in question were acquired by Konrad Theodor Preuss in 1915, who was an ethnologist and curator at the Königliches Museum für Völkerkunde (Royal Museum of Ethnology), the predecessor to the Ethnologisches Museum. During a research trip to Colombia between 1913 and 1919, Preuss gathered together more than 700 objects, of which some 440 remain in the collection of the Ethnologisches Museum. The rest were lost during the war. The true focus of his research, however, was the oral traditions of the peoples he visited.
As part of this trip, Preuss also spent several months with the Kogi, who refer to themselves as the Kágaba, where the audio recordings were made. Working together with multiple mamas, he recorded myths and songs in the language of the Kágaba (kougian), and published them in 1926 in a German translation. In addition to this, he put together a small collection of Kogi objects, 80 of which have been preserved to this day. Preuss acquired both masks from the heir of a deceased mama, “thanks to this fortunate opportunity”, as he writes in his 1926 book Forschungsreise zu den Kágaba (Research Trip to the Kágaba).