Libération - 10.03.2020

Copyright © 2020 The New York Times

TUESDAY, MARCH 10, 2020

INTERNATIONAL WEEKLY

In collaboration with

By ALEX MARSHALL

In 2004, Steve Dunstone and Tim-

othy Awoyemi stood by the River

Niger.

The two men, both police officers in

Britain, were taking part in a journey

through Nigeria, organized through

the Police Expedition Society, and

had reached the town of Agenebode.

A crowd came to meet them; there

was even a dance performance.

In the back of the crowd, Mr.

Awoyemi, 52, who was born in Britain

and grew up in Nigeria, noticed two

men holding what looked like political

placards. Just as the boat was about

to push off, one of the men clambered

down toward it.

The man reached out his arm

across the water and handed Mr.

Dunstone, 61, a note, then hurried off.

That night, Mr. Dunstone pulled the

note from his pocket. It said: “Please

help return the Benin Bronzes.”

He didn’t know what it meant.

But that note was the beginning of a

10-year mission that would take Mr.

Dunstone and Mr. Awoyemi from

Nigeria to Britain and back again, in-

volve the grandson of one of the Brit-

ish soldiers responsible for the loot-

ing, and see the pair embroiled in a

debate about how to right the wrongs

of the colonial past.

By the end, Mr. Dunstone and Mr.

Awoyemi would have done more to

return looted art to Nigeria — with

two small artifacts — than some of

the world’s leading museums, where

the debate over the right of return

continues.

The Benin Bronzes are not actually

from the country of Benin; they come

from the ancient Kingdom of Benin,

now in southern Nigeria.

They’re also not made from bronze.

The various artifacts we call the Be-

nin Bronzes include carved elephant

tusks and ivory leopard statues, even

wooden heads. The most famous

items are 900 brass plaques, dating

mainly from the 16th and 17th centu-

ries, once nailed to pillars in Benin’s

royal palace. There are at least 3,000

items scattered worldwide, maybe

thousands more.

You can find Benin Bronzes in many

of the West’s great museums, includ-

ing the British Museum in London

and the Metropolitan Museum of Art

in New York. They’re in smaller mu-

seums, too. The Lehman, Rockefeller,

Ford and de Rothschild families have

owned some. So did Pablo Picasso.

Their importance was appreciat-

ed in Europe from the moment they

were first seen there in the 1890s.

Curators at the British Museum com-

pared them at that time with the best

of Italian and Greek sculpture.

Today, the artifacts still leave peo-

ple dumbstruck. Neil MacGregor, the

British Museum’s former director,

has called them “great works of art”

and “triumphs of metal casting.”

There’s one place, however, where

few of the original artifacts are

found: Benin City, where they were

made.

That may change. Benin’s royal

family and the Nigerian local and

national governments plan to open a

museum in Benin City in 2023 with at

least 300 Benin Bronzes.

Those pieces will come mainly from

the collections of 10 major Europe-

an museums, such as the Humboldt

Forum in Berlin, the Weltmuseum

in Vienna and the British Museum.

They will initially be on loan for three

years, with the possibility to renew.

Or, when those loans run out, other Be-

nin Bronzes could replace them. The

Coronavirus

Is a Blow

To Global

Interaction

By STEVEN ERLANGER
BRUSSELS — Globalization, that
catchall for our interconnectedness, was
already under assault from populists,
trade warriors and climate activists,
having become an easy target for much
that ails us.
Now comes the coronavirus. Its
spread, experts say, may be a decisive
moment in the fervid debates over how
much the world integrates or separates.
Even before the virus arrived in Eu-
rope, climate change, security concerns
and complaints about unfair trade had
intensified anxieties about global air
travel and globalized industrial supply
chains, as well as reinforcing doubts
about the reliability of China as a part-
ner.
The virus already has dealt another
blow to slowing economies, and embold-
ened populists to revive calls, tinged
with racism and xenophobia, for tough-
er controls over migrants, tourists and
even multinational corporations.
Among all the challenges to globaliza-
tion, many of them political or ideologi-
cal, this virus may be different.
“We’re at the mercy of nature, and
when episodes pass we forget and car-
ry on,” said Ivan Vejvoda, a fellow at the
Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna.
“But this virus has put forward all these
questions about the interconnectedness
of the world as we’ve built it.” As the vi-
rus spreads, Mr. Vejvoda said, “it makes
China seem a bit more fragile and de-
pendence on China as ‘the factory of the
world’ more iffy.”
The political tensions between the
United States and China over trade, as
well as concerns about climate change,
already had raised questions about the
sense and cost of shipping parts country
to country and the potential for carbon
taxes at borders, said Robin Niblett, di-
rector of Chatham House, the London
research institution.
Coupled with the risk of a supply chain

Con tin ued on Page II

LAUREN FLEISHMAN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES; BELOW, PHOTOGRAPHS BY TOM JAMIESON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Benin Bronzes at the British Museum in London are some of the artifacts looted by British troops in the 19th century.

Looted Art, Far From Africa

Two British police officers

tried to right a past wrong.

Con tin ued on Page II

Steve

Dunstone,

far left, and

Timothy

Awoyemi

worked for

10 years to

return some

of the art to

Nigeria.

HECTOR RETAMAL/
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
Affordable global air travel
connects the world, but it also
allows for faster spread of diseases.