Native American group denounces Met’s exhibition of indigenous objects

Wooden war club ('Anishinaabe or  Ojibwa')
Charles and Valerie Diker Collection

A new exhibition in the American wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (Art of Native America: the Charles and Valerie Diker Collection) is provoking criticism (Gabriella Angeletti, 'Native American group denounces Met’s exhibition of indigenous objects', The Art Newspaper, 16th November 2018 ). The exhibition is assembled from more than 100 promised gifts and loans, as well as some items that have entered the museum’s permanent collection, from the collection of the two New York philanthropists. It was spun by Charles Diker as 'the first show of Native American works to be presented as American art rather than tribal art' (which if true in itself is pretty disgusting). But a Native American advocacy group is sharply criticising the exhibition contending that it violates ethical practices:

Shannon O'Loughlin, the executive director of the Association on American Indian Affairs (AAIA), argues that curators “did not consult with affiliated tribal representatives to perform their due diligence, but their first mistake was to call these objects art”. She adds, “Most of these items are not art: they are ceremonial or funerary objects that belong with their original communities and could only have ended up in a private collection through trafficking and looting”. The Met counters that it has regularly conferred with Native American representatives. [...] The museum did not specify which communities have been consulted. [...] O'Loughlin adds, “We’re past the time where institutions and archaeologists tell our story—museums should give us the basic respect to tell our own stories”.

Sylvia Yount (the Lawrence A. Fleischman curator in charge of the American wing of the museum), countered that the Met is “committed to representing cultures from around the world”.

 She adds, “The Met has a panel of tribal advisors who regrettably did not connect with the tribes and determine whether it was appropriated to show these works”. She invokes the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, a law passed in 1990 that obligates museums receiving federal funds to have their holdings of Native American objects and human remains inventoried and to allow Native American tribes the right to repatriation. However, the law is not applicable to private collections or promised gifts and loans.

 The Association on American Indian Affairs has not yet received a direct response from the museum