On July 15, at a royal ceremony buzzing with press, the University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art's Curator of African Art, Cory Gundlach, walked up to Oba (King) Ewuare II’s throne to hand him two works of art that had been stolen over 100 years before.
The ceremony at the Royal Palace of the Oba of Benin in Nigeria marked the first time a North American institution has returned stolen artwork directly to the royal family, rather than the Nigerian government.
“It's historic, and it's something to feel really good about,” Gundlach told IPR. “It positions us globally as the first museum to do that, and so it sets an example, and opens the door and challenges other museums in North America to do the same.”
The artwork — a wooden hen and a brass plaque — are part of a collection of thousands of brass, ivory and wooden sculptures known as the Benin Bronzes. British forces stole many of them in 1897, during an invasion and massacre of Benin City — the capital and largest city of Edo State in southern Nigeria — that burned down the palace. The art has since been scattered among museum collections around the world.
The Stanley Museum had six bronzes in its collection, some gifted by the museum's namesake family, Max and Betty Stanley, from their personal collection, and some purchased from other galleries in the late '90s and early 2000s. Student researcher Mason Koelm, supervised by Gundlach, helped trace two bronzes — the wooden hen and the brass plaque — back to the siege. The origins of the other four are currently being researched, though Gundlach speculates they will also end up needing to be returned.
The road to restitution
Museums that previously sought to return Benin Bronzes navigated a storm of controversy in Nigeria over who the art belonged to. Some aimed to return the art to the Nigerian government in a process known as repatriation, but members of the Stanley Museum’s research team took a different approach, called restitution, which returns the art directly to descendants of the family they were stolen from.
“It was never my intention to go through the repatriation process, because I knew from the beginning that these objects needed to go back to the oba,” Gundlach said.
Gundlach felt strongly about returning the artwork directly to the family, since they were the ones whose ancestors had endured unspeakable tragedy.
“There's a lot of emotional weight associated with these objects that is traumatic and violent, and so the passion around this project is part of that emotional association of loss and trauma with these objects," he said. "I mean, it was a horrific moment in human history.”
“It was never my intention to go through the repatriation process, because I knew from the beginning that these objects needed to go back to the oba."Cory Gundlach, curator of African Art at the University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art
That decision was affirmed in 2023, when departing Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari declared that the royal family of Benin were the rightful owners of the bronzes. It meant many museums' plans to return the sculptures to the government were spoiled. But by that point, the Stanley had already established a relationship with members of the Benin royal family, including Peju Layiwola, the maternal granddaughter of the former oba, and Prince Aghatise Erediauwa.
A historic ceremony
Gundlach says he sees the restitution ceremony as one of the most important moments of his life.
Addressing Oba Ewuare II, standing in the palace, built on the site burnt down in 1897, he apologized on behalf of the University of Iowa and the Stanley Museum of Art for using the Benin Bronzes to teach without the oba's permission.
“No one asked me to apologize — that came from my heart," he said. "It just felt like the right thing to do."
He hopes other museums follow suit, and stop using the Benin Bronzes without proper authorization.
“I think the future is bright, and I think that in a matter of time, more museums will develop this relationship that is central to the respect that the family deserves.”
