Humboldt Forum: Agreement on the Repatriation of the Benin Bronzes in the Ethnologisches Museum Still Planned for 2022

29.06.2022
Ethnologisches Museum

An agreement on the transfer of ownership and loans of the “Benin Bronzes” held in the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin Ethnologisches Museum (Ethnological Museum) collection is to be finalised with the responsible authorities in Nigeria in the latter half of 2022. This was decided on Monday by the Stiftungsrat der Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz (Board of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation), chaired by Claudia Roth, Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media. 

Negotiations on reparation of the works has been ongoing since March 2021 under the Minister of Culture’s leadership. Representing the German side in the talks were Hermann Parzinger and Barbara Plankensteiner, spokesperson for the Benin Dialogue Group and director of Hamburg’s MARKK, Museum am Rothenbaum Kulturen und Künste der Welt.