Black group tells Met not to return king’s bronzes: ‘Slavery profits’By Isabel Vincent
April 29, 2023
He has five wives, a $500,000 Rolls Royce — and is trying to get back $30 billion in artworks stolen from his ancestors 135 years ago, including some of the Met Museum’s most precious works.
Oba Ewuare II of the Kingdom of Benin, a hereditary king in Nigeria, has already received three of the works known as the Benin Bronzes from the Met, and others from the Smithsonian in what it said was repatriation to “right a wrong.”
But now the Oba is facing an unexpected battle, from African-American campaigners in New York who say the bronzes were the proceeds of the royal’s ancestor selling their ancestors into slavery.
The group is moving to sue the Smithsonian to stop plans for the Oba to get even more of its Benin Bronzes and is in talks with the Met to stop it from sending its collection of 154 artifacts to Nigeria.
Lawyer Deadria Farmer-Paellmann, the executive director of Restitution Study Group, the non-profit trying to stop the repatriation of the Benin Bronzes, told The Post: “These are slave trade relics that are being returned to the heirs of the slave trade. They are rewarding slavery twice.”
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Source:
https://nypost.com/2023/04/29/black-group-tells-met-not-to-return-kings-slavery-profits/
