Showing posts with label museums. Show all posts
Showing posts with label museums. Show all posts

Thursday, October 31, 2024

Who Owns Antiquity? Unraveling the Origins of Nok Sculptures of the Ancient Nok Kingdom in Nigeria

Have you read "Who Owns Antiquity?"

Museums and the Battle Over Our Ancient Heritage" by James Cuno, Princeton University Press, 2008.

How can the academic luminary Prof. Kwame Anthony Appiah, author of "Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers"(Norton, 2006) ask "Whose Culture is it Anyway?" and query the origins of the sculptors of the famous Nok terracotta sculptures found in the middle belt region of Nigeria existed from around 500 B.C.E. to 200 C.E. 

He said the Nok sculptures were not made for the Nok  people.

I have to doubt his knowledge of the historical facts of Nigerian arts and culture. He should have done his research beyond the walls of Princeton University before the publication of his book.

Nok sculptures were made by the Nok people of the ancient Nok Kingdom on themselves for themselves over 2000 years. And the most recent excavations and the latest discoveries have proved that the sculptures were done by the people on different aspects of their lives like historians who wrote books on objects and subjects of different people and events in different places and times.

He should read about the latest discoveries on 

https://www.modernghana.com/news/499121/newly-discovered-nok-sculptures-exhibited-for-the-first-time.html

Kwame Akroma-Ampim Kusi Anthony Appiah FRSL (/ˈæpiɑː/ AP-ee-ah; born 8 May 1954) is a British-American philosopher and writer who has written about political philosophy, ethics, the philosophy of language and mind, and African intellectual history. Appiah is Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University, where he joined the faculty in 2014.[2] He was previously the Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University.[3] Appiah was elected President of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in January 2022.

https://appiah.net/


By Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima,

Publisher/Editor,
NOLLYWOOD MIRROR® Series
The first book series on Nollywood and the Nigerian film industry since 2013.
Affiliate Partner,
Cinewav of Singapore
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Sunday, September 5, 2021

Please, Don't Return Nigerian Artworks in Foreign Art Galleries and Museums

Please, Don't Return Nigerian Artworks in Foreign Art Galleries and Museums

#art #history #gallery #contemporaryart #painting #artgallery #fineart #heritage #nigeria #artist #education #arts
#museums #artcollection #curator #conservation #preservation #drawings #artexhibition

If you see the dilapidated buildings in the National Museum and National Gallery of Arts in Lagos, you will not want the Nigerian artworks in foreign museums to be returned to Nigeria.Because, Nigerians cannot preserve or protect our artworks. They are better preserved and safer in American and European art galleries and museums.

My masterpiece of painting, "Blessed Mother" I made live in the Education Unit of the National Museum in Onikan on the Lagos Island was later missing from the museum and never found till date. Some of my colourful illustrations were missing at the UNICEF in Nigeria in 1988 and not found till date.

The private art galleries don't have the funds and management for the preservation of artworks and many of the galleries have incompetent staff without certification in art curation or preservation. Many galleries have  closed without any any records of the whereabouts of the artworks. I have lost priceless works without trace when custodians relocated without notice.

Nigerians cannot preserve our artworks.
Please, don't return them to Nigeria.


- By EKENYERENGOZI Michael Chima 

Publisher/Editor, 

NOLLYWOOD MIRROR®Series 

247 Nigeria (@247nigeria) / Twitter

https://mobile.twitter.com/247nigeria

https://www.amazon.com/author/ekenyerengozimichaelchima

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