2. The Looted Masks

Fingerprints

Fingerprints Episode 2
Dan Hicks takes us on a journey with three bronze masks from the West African city of Benin, through the hands of soldiers, collectors, and curators, and along with special guests considers the responsibility that European museums have towards looted art in their collections. Find a transcript of this episode here
Read more

• View the masks spoken about in the episode here
• Read the Pitt Rivers’ interim report on the provenance of African cultural heritage in their collection here
• Find out more about the Benin Bronzes and the Benin Dialogue Group here
• Find out more about Oxford University’s procedures about the return of cultural objects here
• And find more about Dan Hicks' book, The Brutish Museums

Speakers in this episode:

• Series host: Lucie Dawkins, Director & Producer, Ashmolean Museum
• Xa Sturgis, Director of the Ashmolean Museum
• Simukai Chigudu, Professor of African Politics, University of Oxford and founding member of Rhodes Must Fall
• Dan Hicks, Professor of Contemporary Archaeology, Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford
• Victor Ehikhamenor, artist
• Adenike Cosgrove, collector and historian of African Art Historian
• Professor Bénédicte Savoy, art historian and co-author of the report, The Restitution of African Cultural Heritage commissioned by President Emmanuel Macron

About the Fingerprints podcast
Every object in the Ashmolean has passed from hand to hand to reach the Museum. In a new podcast, we uncover the invisible fingerprints left behind by makers, looters, archaeologists, soldiers, rulers, curators, and many more. These stories of touch reveal the ways in which the forces of conflict and colonialism have shaped Britain’s oldest Museum. Join the Ashmolean’s curators alongside artists, experts, and community members, for our new podcast: Fingerprints.
Fingerprints will be released on the Ashmolean’s website, on Spotify, Apple, and wherever you get your podcasts, weekly from 21 January 2022 until 25 February 2022.
Fingerprints is produced and hosted by Lucie Dawkins. Guests include Bénédicte Savoy, co-author of the Report on African Cultural Heritage, commissioned by Emmanuel Macron; Professor Dan Hicks, of Oxford’s Pitt Rivers Museum; and Simukai Chigudu, one of the founding members of the Rhodes Must Fall campaign.
www.ashmolean.org/fingerprints