Is a Museum Just a Trophy Case? (Update)

The world’s great museums are full of art and artifacts that were plundered during an era when plunder was the norm. Now there’s a push to return these works to their rightful owners. Sounds simple, right? It’s not. (Part 2 of an updated series originally published in 2023.)
 

• SOURCES:
  • Matthew Bogdanos, assistant district attorney in the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and chief of the Antiquities Trafficking Unit.
  • Nicholas Cullinan, director of the British Museum.
  • Victor Ehikhamenor, Nigerian writer and artist.
  • David Frum, staff writer at The Atlantic.
  • Dan Hicks, professor of contemporary archaeology at the University of Oxford and curator of world archaeology at the Pitt Rivers Museum.
  • Bénédicte Savoy, professor of art history at the Technical University in Berlin.

• RESOURCES:
  • “These Looted Treasures Are Home. What Now?,” by Alex Marshall (New York Times, 2025).
  • “France’s Long-Awaited Restitution Policy Is Finally Here,” by Vincent Noce (The Art Newspaper, 2023).
  • Africa’s Struggle for Its Art: History of a Postcolonial Defeat, by Bénédicte Savoy (2022).
  • “Who Benefits When Western Museums Return Looted Art?” by David Frum (The Atlantic, 2022).
  • “Museums in England and Wales to Gain Powers to Dispose of Objects on Moral Grounds,” by Dalya Alberge (The Guardian, 2022).
  • The Brutish Museums: The Benin Bronzes, Colonial Violence and Cultural Restitution, by Dan Hicks (2020).
  • “The Restitution of African Cultural Heritage. Toward a New Relational Ethics,” by Bénédicte Savoy and Felwine Sarr (2018).

• EXTRAS:
  • “Can a Museum Be the Conscience of a Nation?,” by Freakonomics Radio (2025).
  • “The Hidden Side of the Art Market,” by Freakonomics Radio (2021).

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