Brief Description: Die Lehrmittelsammlung an der Fakultät für Gestaltung der Hochschule Pforzheim steht sowohl für Designausbildung als auch für internationale Wirtschafts- und Gesellschaftsgeschichte. Die Sammlung umfasste einst mehrere tausend Objekte wie originale Schmuckstücke, Gipsabgüsse, Tierpräparate, Vorlagenwerke und Glasdias. KUPFER erforscht in zwei Teilprojekten, wie die Lehrmittelsammlung in Unterricht und Ausstellung eingesetzt wurde (Dr. Anna-Sophie Laug) und welche Rolle Provenienz und Innovation spielten und bis heute spielen können (Tabea Schmid M.A.).

Duration: 07.2023–06.2027

Funding: BMBF (Vernetzen – Erschließen – Forschen. Allianz für Hochschulsammlungen II)

Co-operation: Schmuckmuseum Pforzheim

Researcher: Evelyn Echle (https://designpf.hs-pforzheim.de/profile/evelyn_echle), Anna Laug, Thomas Hensel (https://www.hs-pforzheim.de/profile/thomashensel) Tabea Schmid (https://designpf.hs-pforzheim.de/profile/tabea_schmid)

Link:designpf.hs-pforzheim.de/kupfer

Brief Description: Using historical-archival research methods, the project examines the acquisition and function of objects in the Basel Mission Collection. Particular attention is paid to the circumstances of object acquisition in colonial contexts and to motives and strategies of missionaries as well as indigenous agents in the „collected-upon“ population. The research project also explores the meaning of the collected objects as they transition from their original functions to becoming representations of mission successes and colonial imaginations in exhibitions.  The research focuses on the Basel Mission collections from Ghana, Cameroon, India and China beginning in the mid-19th century, peaking with the Basel Mission exhibition of 1908 and ending with the outbreak of the First World War.

Duration: 2016 – 2019

Funding: Georges und Miriam Kinzel Fonds

Researcher: Dagmar Konrad und Isabella Bozsa

Link: https://www.mkb.ch/de/museum/fellowship.html

Brief Description: This project retraces the provenance and collection history of Tibetan and Indian artefacts the Museum of Ethnology in Berlin bought in 1906 from L. A. Waddell (1854-1938) with the financial support of the art patron Gerson Simon. As an Indian Army surgeon, amateur researcher and archaeologist stationed in British India, Waddell acquired Tibetan artefacts under highly problematic conditions in his position as “cultural consultant” on the 1903-1904 British invasion of Tibet led by Colonel Younghusband. The collection, located today in the Museum of Asian Art and the Museum of Ethnology, Berlin, consists of primarily three object groups: Tibetan ritual devices and material culture, Tibetan painted scrolls and Indian sculpture. Considered as one of the foremost authorities on Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism in his time, however, Waddell’s books on the history of civilization have caused controversy and contributed to fascistic ideology. Therefore, the project seeks to investigate the role of the Berlin collection in the light of this arguable personality and locate it within scientific, military and colonial collection strategies. Publication research results:

Duration: 2016 – 2017

Funding: Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut: Regina Höfer

Researcher: Regina Höfer

Publications: Regina Höfer: 1906: L. A. Waddell, Brief an den Direktor des Königlichen Museums für Völkerkunde, Berlin, kommentiert von Regina Höfer, in: Translocations. Anthologie: Eine Sammlung kommentierter Quellentexte zu Kulturgutverlagerungen seit der Antike, 19.8.2019. Regina Höfer: Provenance Research on a Colonial Ethnographic Collection: The Legacy of L. A. Waddell in Berlin Museums, in: Baessler-Archiv. Beiträge zur Völkerkunde, Band 64, 2017, S. 39-64.

Link: https://www.khi.fi.it/index.php

Brief Description: The research project investigates the question of how art and cultural artefacts have been collected and distributed in colonial South Asia, Burma and Tibet and the ways these have reached Western collections. Therefore, the entangled infrastructure of archaeologists, collectors, British officials, dealers, museums and other colonial institutions needs close inspection. One of the most important protagonists is L. A. Waddell (1854-1938). The Asian Art Museum and the Museum of Ethnology in Berlin house his collection besides major British museums. As an Indian Army surgeon, amateur researcher and archaeologist stationed in British India, Waddell had first-hand access to local culture and countless opportunities to obtain artefacts: During his own archaeological excavation in the Swat Valley (1895) or several British military operations to Burma and Beijing (Boxer Rebellion) for example. Many of these were problematic from a contemporary point of view and included war booty. Studying this important protagonist will thus be crucial in mapping and understanding the entangled landscape of art connoisseurship, collection and trade in colonial South Asia.

Duration: 2018 – 2019

Funding: Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut

Researcher: Regina Höfer

Link: https://www.khi.fi.it/index.php

Brief Description: The subject of the proactive provenance research are about 50 human remains from colonial acquisition contexts of the 19th and early 20th centuries. They come from West, East and Southern Africa as well as Oceania. The collections have very heterogeneous histories

Duration: 11.2018 – 10.2019

Funding: Drittmittel von der Fritz Thyssen-Stiftung

Co-operation with Southafrica: Ciraj Rassool (University of the Western Cape, Cape Town) und mit Tanzania: N.N. (im Aufbau) sowie mit Kamerun: N.N. (im Aufbau)

Researcher: Thomas Schnalke (Leiter), Sarah Fründt und Holger Stoecker

Link: https://www.bmm-charite.de/

Brief Description: The subject of the historical and anthropological provenance research were about 120 human remains that had been collected by various people in New Zealand at the end of the 19th/beginning of the 20th century. They were returned to New Zealand in April/May 2019.

Duration: 2016-2019

Funding: non

Researcher: Andreas Winkelmann (Projektleitung) und Sarah Fründt

Brief Description: For the exhibition project 'Object Biographies', research was carried out on three sets of objects, each of which deals with the question of the collection and reception history of the objects: In particular, research was conducted on a pair of figures from the Kingdom of Kom, north of the Cameroon grasslands (III C 20681 III C 20682), which the German colonial officer Hans Caspar zu Putlitz looted with his troop in 1905. The second object was a caryatid stool (III C 14966), which came to the museum in 1902 through the collector Werner von Grawert. The research question dealt on the one hand with the migration of the stool within East Africa. On the other hand, the increase in value of the stool was traced, which gained notoriety in particular through its attribution as an object of the 'Bulimeister / Buli Werkstatt'. The third group of objects concerned so-called Bocios, which came into the collection from Benin in 1967 through the collector O.A. Jäger. This group of objects was further investigated during a research trip to Benin and Togo with the Beninese art historian Romuald Tchibozo. The research was carried out in close cooperation with the curators of the Africa Collection and also served to prepare the exhibition modules in the Humboldt Forum.

Duration: 2014 – 2015

Funding: Humboldt Lab Dahlem (Kulturstiftung des Bundes)

Co-operation: Université d’Abomey Calavi, Benin

Researcher: Margareta von Oswald, Verena Rodatus, Romuald Tchibozo und Paola Ivanov

Link: http://www.humboldt-lab.de/projektarchiv/probebuehne-6/objektbiografien/teaser/index.html

Brief Description: Was macht (postkoloniale) Provenienzforschung in sogenannten ethnographischen Sammlungen aus? In diesem Forschungsprojekt wird u.a. dieser Fragestellung nachgegangen. Ausgangspunkt bilden ausgewählte Objekte und Objektgruppen der mehr als 10.200 Objekte umfassenden Sammlungen aus dem heute festländischen Tansania. Deren größter Teil gelangte während der gewaltförmigen deutschen kolonialen Expansion und Herrschaft in Ostafrika nach Berlin. Der Fokus liegt unter anderem auf der Rekonstruktion biographischer Fragmente und Aneignungskontexte von Objekten, die im Kontext kolonialer Kriege in das Museum gelangten. Dabei geht es darum, europäische Sammler zu de-zentrieren, indem, wenn möglich, die Nachfahr_innen der ostafrikanischen Vorbesitzer_innen, Nutzer_innen und Produzent_innen sichtbar gemacht werden. Neben dem Aufbau einer Forschungskooperation mit tansanischen Partner_innen und Erprobung kooperativer Formate in Form von residencies tansanischer Kolleg_innen und Workshops in Berlin, werden die Objekte schrittweise digitalisiert und die Objektdaten online veröffentlicht. Eine Online-Ausstellung mit Projektergebnissen ist für Frühjahr 2020 geplant. Im Juli 2019 hat ein dreijähriges kooperatives Provenienzforschungsprojekt mit der University of Dar es Salaam, dem National Museum of Tanzania sowie der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin begonnen.

Duration: Juli 2016 – 2020

Funding: Kuratorium Preußischer Kulturbesitz

Co-operation: University of Dar es Salaam, National Museum of Tanzania, Nafasi Art Space (Dar es Salaam), tansanische Künstler_innen

Researcher: Paola Ivanov, Kristin Weber-Sinn und Hendryk Ortlieb (bis Dezember 2018)

Brief Description: Humboldt Lab Tanzania has been a multi-disciplinary project that has taken ethnological and museological questions of cultural heritage into a broad dialogue through collaboration with academics and cultural practitioners. The exchanges have taken place between Tanzanian and German organizations from the academic and cultural sectors. They are the Ethnologisches Museum in Berlin, the University of Dar es Salaam, the National Museum and House of Culture, the Goethe-Institut Tanzania, Bookstop Sanaa Visual Art Library, Nafasi Art Space and the Tanzanian artists Amani Abeid, Douglas Kahabuka, Nicholas Calvin Mwakatobe and Pia Rutaiwa. The project Humboldt Lab Tanzania has placed at the center of its research-oriented work ethnographic objects from Tanzania, which have been appropriated in the context of anti-colonial wars of resistance during German colonial rule 1885–1918. Keystones of the project have been a joint Tanzanian-German provenance research field trip, an artistic research and residency program, an international conference at the Goethe-Institute Tanzania and the three-language publication “Humboldt Lab Tanzania. Objects from the colonial wars in the Ethnologisches Museum, Berlin – a Tanzanian-German Dialogue”, Berlin 2018. The “findings” of Humboldt Lab Tanzania have been presented in a multi-disciplinary touring exhibition entitled Living Inside the Story. The exhibition was shown at the National Museum and House of Culture, Dar es Salaam, the University of Dar es Salaam and at the Maji Maji Memorial Museum in Songea where it did coincide with the annual commemorations of the Maji Maji War of Resistance.

Duration: Juni 2014 – Juni 2018

Funding: Kulturstiftung des Bundes (Fonds TURN), Kuratorium Preußischer Kulturbesitz

Co-operation: University of Dar es Salaam: Department of History, Department of Fine and Performing Arts, Department of Archaeology; National Museum and House of Culture, Dar es Salaam und Maji Maji Memorial Museum, Songea; Nafasi Art Space (Artists: Amani Abeid, Douglas Kahabuka, Nicholas Calvin Mwakatobe, Pia Rutaiwa); Bookstop Sanaa Visual Art Library & Creative Learning Space, Dar es Salaam (Sarita Mamseri); Goethe-Institut Tansania

Researcher: Paola Ivanov (Projektleitung Berlin), Lili Reyels (Projektleitung Tansania und Kuratorin Living Inside the Story), Sarita Mamseri (Künstlerische Leitung) und Kristin Weber-Sinn (wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin), Hendryk Ortlieb (Museologe)

Links: http://www.reimer-mann-verlag.de/controller.php?

Brief Description: Die erste Phase des Projekts beinhaltete die Erfassung vorläufige Provenienz-Untersuchung und Online-Stellung der Sammlung von ca. 1400 Objekten aus Namibia im Ethnologischen Museum. Diese Phase wurde gemeinsam mit ExpertInnen aus Namibia durchgeführt, die die Geschichten der Objekte recherchierten und ihr Potenzial für zukünftige Projekte mit WissenschaftlerInnen, KünstlerInnen und Communities zu evaluierten. Auch wurde die Sammlung untersucht um Objekte von besonderer kultureller Relevanz zu bestimmen, aber auch solche diejenigen Objekte, die in genozidären und anderen Gewaltkontexten angeeignet wurden. Eine zweite Phase, finanziert durch die Gerda Henkel Stiftung, wird ausgewählte Objekte zurück nach Namibia bringen, um sie dort in Workshops zu untersuchen.  Ziel der Workshops ist das Wissen über die Objekte zu reaktivieren und sie an die heutigen Interessen der Wissenschaft, Kunst und Communities in Namibia zu verknüpfen. Es ist auch ein Sammlungskatalog zum Gesamtbestand in dem Ethnologischen Museum der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin in Bearbeitung.

Duration: 2017 – 2021

Funding: Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Gerda Henkel Stiftung

Co-operation: Museums Association of Namibia, University of Namibia, National Museum of Namibia.

Researcher: Julia Binter, Kolja Drescher, Golda Ha-Eiros, Hertha Hishekwa, Jonathan Fine, Nehoa Kautondokwa, Cynthia Schimming und Jeremy Silvester

Brief Description: In den Sammlungen des Ethnologischen Museums befinden sich zirka 2.000 menschliche Überreste, die zu verschiedenen Zeiten und aus unterschiedlichen Motiven angelegt. Der Provenienzforschung an menschlichen Überresten kommt dabei eine besondere Bedeutung zu, da es sich um die Überreste menschlicher Individuen handelt, die auch aufgrund einer rassistischen Wissenschafts- und Sammlungspraxis in die Sammlungen ethnologischer Museen gelangte.
Ein erstes Ziel der Provenienzforschung an den menschlichen Überresten im Ethnologischen Museum Berlin ist eine Bestandsaufnahme. Besondere Priorität wird die Erforschung der Aneignungskontexte der Schädel der anthropologischen Sammlungen haben, die sich heute noch im Ethnologischen Museum befinden. Dringend aufgearbeitet werden Überreste ohne oder mit nur geringen Herkunftsinformationen. Hierzu zählen insbesondere nummernlose Schädel und Knochen.
Über die Zukunft der menschlichen Überreste soll ein ergebnisoffener Dialog mit unterschiedlichen Interessengruppen initiiert werden. Hierbei geht es insbesondere um die Einbeziehung von Akteuren aus Herkunftsgesellschaften, um den weiteren Umgang mit den menschlichen Überresten zu diskutieren.

Duration: 2020 – 2022

Funding: Eigenmittel der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin, Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz

Institutions: Ethnologisches Museum Berlin; Zentralarchiv der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin

Researcher: Ilja Labischinski

Brief Description: Um den Status ethnographischer Sammlungen in Deutschland ist eine heftige Debatte entbrannt, in der die Frage des Eigentums zentral ist. Am Beispiel der Tansania-Sammlung des Ethnologischen Museums Berlin im Humboldt Forum fokussiert sich das Projekt auf die affektive und emotionale Dimension solcher Eigentumskonflikte, in denen nicht nur unterschiedliche Akteursgruppen sondern auch Eigentumskonzeptionen miteinander konkurrieren. Das Projekt untersucht im Rahmen eines multi-sited fieldwork in Deutschland und Tansania, wie Eigentum in diesem Konfliktgeschehen institutionell transformiert wird. Ziel des Projekts ist, die Rolle von Affektivität und Emotionen in solchen sozio-rechtlichen Transformationsprozessen genauer zu konturieren.

Duration: Juli 2019 – Juni 2022

Funding: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

Co-operation: Nachfahren der Produzent_innen, Nutzer_innen und Vorbesitzer_innen der Objekte

Researcher: Paola Ivanov, Jonas Benz, Laibor Kalanga und Leonie Benker

Brief Description: Dissertationsprojekt an der FU Berlin (Kunsthistorisches Institut, Abteilung Kunst Afrikas) zu einer Sammlung, die Leo Frobenius in den Jahren 1907-1909 im heutigen Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso und Togo gesammelt hat. Ziel ist eine historische Aufarbeitung der Expedition und der daraus hervorgegangenen Sammlung und ihrer Analyse im Kontext gegenwärtiger postkolonialer Fragestellungen.

Duration: 2019 – 2022

Funding: Junior Fellowship am Internationalen Forschungszentrum für Kulturwissenschaften (IFK), Wien

Co-operation: Evtl. Zusammenarbeit mit Musée National du Mali

Researcher: Cécile Bründlmayer

Brief Description: The project aims to create a model for the future care of colonial collections in sound archives. The main focus is on researching and providing access to the sound recordings of the Lautarchiv, which were produced in German prisoner of war camps during the First World War. At present, there are over 450 recordings in the collection documenting the voices of African colonial soldiers. In the first phase of the project, the metadata for these audio documents will be rewritten in close collaboration with the Institut Fundamental d'Afrique Noire in Dakar, Senegal. Genealogical and provenance research on the soldiers' places of origin will also be carried out. In the second phase, participants from the respective source communities will re-translate the recordings. In the long term, the goal is to share the digitised recordings with their historical written documents with as many African archives as possible. 

Duration: 2024–2026

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation

Cooperation: Institut Fundamental d’Afrique Noire, Senegal

Researcher: Christopher Li (christopher.li.1@hu-berlin.de), Alina Januscheck (alina.januscheck@hu-berlin.de) (till February 2025), Katarzyna Puzon (katarzyna.puzon@hu-berlin.de) 

Link: https://www.lautarchiv.hu-berlin.de/

Brief Description:Based on the collection of ethnological objects in four collections (Museum Querfurt Castle, Institute for Regional Geography Leipzig, MARKK, Ethnological Museum Berlin), the project aims to explore the contexts of Hans Schomburgk's (1880-1967) acquisition of ethnographic objects in different regions in Africa between 1897 and 1958. Schomburgk travelled to Africa in various capacities - as a military officer, big game hunter and animal trapper, explorer, animal or documentary filmmaker. His collecting activities were not the decisive reason for his travels, but they were an important aspect, especially during his journeys as a documentary filmmaker. For a reconstruction of the collecting activities, it is therefore necessary to include his activities as an animal trapper and documentary filmmaker, insofar as they provide conclusions about the provenance of the objects to be researched. Investigating Schomburgk's activities is not only highly relevant because he was one of the most active mediators of knowledge about Africa, but also because a connection in his collecting of ethnographies, naturalia and film footage is evident that has not yet been investigated in detail. The contexts of the collection will be explored in dialogue with representatives of the societies of origin, with a focus on Liberia.

Duration: January-December 2022

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation (DZK)

Researcher: Lars Müller

Cooperation: National Museum of Liberia, Monrovia; University of Liberia, Monrovia (J Kerkula Foeday, Chairman, Department of Sociology, Anthropology, & Criminology) sowie dem MARKK, Hamburg; Ethnologisches Museum, Berlin

Link: https://www.khi.fi.it/index.php

Brief Description: In the years 1901 - 1908, the Municipal Museum Braunschweig received a collection of about 700 objects of the Braunschweig-born Kurt Strümpell, who was stationed in Cameroon as a member of the Schutztruppe from 1900. Strümpell was first head of the military station in Tinto (from 1901), then arrived in northern Cameroon with the German military expedition and was colonial resident in Adamaua (1906 - 1909). Strümpell collected objects in West-, Southwest- and Northwest region of Cameroon as well as in today's Adamaoua, the North and Far north region of Cameroon and parts of Nigeria. The aim is to investigate how and under what circumstances Strümpell got hold of the objects, what acquisition modalities he used and how they were connected with German colonial rule. The provenance research will be carried out within the framework of the PAESE joint project and is based on Strümpell's collection in the museum as well as museum publications, further research literature, archive research and cooperation with experts from Cameroon. In addition, the dissertation project will survey different cultures of remembrance regarding the provenance of the collection. On the basis of the museum documentation and oral tradition at former collection sites, it will be examined how colonial acquisition contexts are remembered or concealed by whom. The present provenance research is intended to make a contribution to a postcolonial culture of remembrance at the museum.

Duration: 01.2019 – 01.2022

Funding: The project is part of the joint project "Provenance Research in Non-European Collections and Ethnology in Lower Saxony" (PAESE) and is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

Cooperation: Cooperation with representatives from the societies of origin is planned throughout PAESE. In 2019 Albert Gouaffo (Université de Dschang) and Paule Dassi (curator at the Palace Museum Batoufam) have been invited as research fellows.

Researcher: Isabella Bozsa (Researcher Municipal Musuem Braunschweig) und Evelin Haase (Curator at the Municipal Museum Braunschweig)

Link: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/paese/teilprojekte/translate-to-english-postkoloniale-erwerbsgeschichten-und-objektbedeutungen/

Brief Description: The provenance research project of the 3Landesmuseen Braunschweig includes both the "Nazi confiscated art" and the “Colonial Contexts”. With regard to the Colonial Contexts it concerns among others the bequests of Heinrich Schlüter (rather few objects and a larger photo collection from Namibia) and Wilhelm Waßmuß (objects and a larger photo collection from East Africa, Zanzibar, Kenya and Iran), Ethnographica from South America, among others, as well as human remains from Canada (Inuit), Peru, Papua New Guinea and Indonesia (Nias), among others. Among the human remains are mainly skulls, but also skeleton parts, mummies, and a moist preparation. Also included in the project are lost human remains of persons whose fate is well documented by sources. In addition, there are individual plaster objects. A photo collection (with separate picture plates) from the field of eugenics / racial studies with references to Colonial Contexts is reaching to the Nazi era. The tasks and objectives of the extensive and heterogeneous project include documentation, clarifying the circumstances of acquisition, contextualization, transparency and dialogue.

Duration: 04.2019 – 03.2022

Funding: State of Lower Saxony

Researcher: Hansjörg Pötzsch

Links: 3landesmuseen-braunschweig.de/en/braunschweigisches-landesmuseum/collection/provenance-research

Brief Description: In the years 1901 - 1908, the Municipal Museum Braunschweig received a collection of about 700 objects of the Braunschweig-born Kurt Strümpell, who was stationed in Cameroon as a member of the Schutztruppe from 1900. Strümpell was first head of the military station in Tinto (from 1901), then arrived in northern Cameroon with the German military expedition and was colonial resident in Adamaua (1906 - 1909). Strümpell collected objects in West-, Southwest- and Northwest region of Cameroon as well as in today's Adamaoua, the North and Far north region of Cameroon and parts of Nigeria. The aim is to investigate how and under what circumstances Strümpell got hold of the objects, what acquisition modalities he used and how they were connected with German colonial rule. The provenance research will be carried out within the framework of the PAESE joint project and is based on Strümpell's collection in the museum as well as museum publications, further research literature, archive research and cooperation with experts from Cameroon. In addition, the dissertation project will survey different cultures of remembrance regarding the provenance of the collection. On the basis of the museum documentation and oral tradition at former collection sites, it will be examined how colonial acquisition contexts are remembered or concealed by whom. The present provenance research is intended to make a contribution to a postcolonial culture of remembrance at the museum.

Duration: 01.2019 – 01.2022

Funding: The project is part of the joint project "Provenance Research in Non-European Collections and Ethnology in Lower Saxony" (PAESE) and is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

Cooperation: Cooperation with representatives from the societies of origin is planned throughout PAESE. In 2019 Albert Gouaffo (Université de Dschang) and Paule Dassi (curator at the Palace Museum Batoufam) have been invited as research fellows.

Researcher:Isabella Bozsa (Researcher Municipal Musuem Braunschweig) und Evelin Haase (Curator at the Municipal Museum Braunschweig)

Link: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/paese/teilprojekte/translate-to-english-postkoloniale-erwerbsgeschichten-und-objektbedeutungen/

Brief Description: The project, which is based at the Übersee-Museum Bremen and carried out in cooperation with the research center “colonial legacy” at the University of Hamburg, explores the history of collections from Cameroon, the former German East Africa (Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda) and German Southwest Africa (Namibia). More specifically, the project interrogates the historical origins of colonial collections from the perspective of both African and German actors. With an actor-centered focus it investigates how collectors gathered non-European objects and the ranges of action, within which impacted societies operated. Thus, on the one hand, it questions facile notions of acquisition legality and, on the other hand, it problematizes lasting notions of African powerlessness during occupation. Ethnological museums are places of a shared cultural memory. From the perspective of many Africans today, the question of why European colonizers "collected" and which cultural treasures are kept in European museums are integral questions of cultural remembrance. At the same time, as an institution whose founding is rooted in the age of “high phase” of German colonial history, the museum is interested in exploring open questions and remembering the histories of its own institution as well as those of its collections.

Duration: November 2016 - April 2021

Funding: Funding initiative "Research in Museums" of the Volkswagen Foundation

Cooperation: Jeremy Silvester (Museum Association of Namibia), Oswald Masebo (University of Dar es Salaam), Philip Maligisu (National Museum of Tanzania), Albert Gouaffo (Université de Dschang) und Prince Kum’a Ndumbe III (Fondation AfricAvenir International)

Researchers: Ndzodo Awono (doctoral researcher/Cameroon collection), Patrick Hege (project coordinator, postdoc researcher/East Africa collection), Christian Jarling (doctoral researcher/Namibia collection)

Links: https://www.kolonialismus.uni-hamburg.de/2017/04/04/presseinformation-getauscht-gekauft-geraubt-koloniale-spurensuche-in-den-afrikanischen-sammlungen-des-uebersee-museums-bremen-provenienzforschung-der-universitaet-hamburg-und-des-uebersee-museums/ https://www.volkswagenstiftung.de/aktuelles-presse/geschichten-aus-der-foerderung/die-eigene-sammlungsgeschichte-erschlie%C3%9Fen-provenienzforschung-im-%C3%BCbersee-museum-bremen

Brief Description: The project intends to trace the provenance and acquisition of 115 human skulls stemming from Melanesia, probably collected during German colonial times. Modelled trophy heads and skulls of ancestors as well as human remains having been collected for the discipline of physical anthropology are kept at the museum. For only 38 of these culturally sensitive objects there are currently references to the collectors. Arts, ancestral worship and cannibalism in New Guinea were fascinating topics to scientists in the late 19th and early 20th century. It is planned to enter into a dialogue with scholars from Papua New Guinea and representatives of different ethnic groups.

Duration: November 2019 – Oktober 2020

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation (DZK)

Researchers: Bettina von Briskorn

Brief Description: Die proaktive Provenienzforschung untersucht die Sammlungsgeschichte von 4 Schädeln aus der ehemaligen Kolonie Deutsch-Ost-Afrika, die den Wadschagga und Dorobbo aus der Region um den Kilimandscharo zugeordnet sind. Die Schädel wurden 1902 von dem späteren Schutztruppen-Leutnant Hermann Trefurth dem Königlich Naturhistorischen Museum zu Dresden geschenkt und befinden sich heute in der anthropologischen Sammlung des Völkerkundemuseums Dresden.

Duration: 01.4.2019 – 31.12.2019

Funding: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Cooperation: Übersetzung des vorläufigen Berichts in Swahili in Arbeit.

Researcher: Birgit Scheps-Bretschneider (Projektleitung), Isabelle Reimann, Mnyaka Sururu Mboro und Sarah Fründt

Brief Description: Gegenstand der historischen und anthropologischen Provenienzforschung waren 9 menschliche Überreste aus kolonialen Erwerbskontexten des 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhunderts. Sie stammen aus verschiedenen afrikanischen Kontexten.

Duration: 04.2019 – 12.2019

Funding: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Researcher: Birgit Scheps-Bretschneider (Projektleitung), Miriam Hamburger und Sarah Fründt

Brief Description: Gegenstand der historischen und anthropologischen Provenienzforschung waren 9 menschliche Überreste aus kolonialen Erwerbskontexten des 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhunderts. Sie stammen aus verschiedenen afrikanischen Kontexten.

Duration: 04.2019 – 12.2019

Funding: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Researcher: Birgit Scheps-Bretschneider (Projektleitung), Miriam Hamburger und Sarah Fründt

Brief Description: Die proaktive Provenienzforschung untersucht die Sammlungsgeschichte von 4 Schädeln mit den Zuordnungen zu Wagogo, Waswahili, Oromoo (“Galla”), die 1921 in die anthropologische Sammlung der Staatlichen Museen für Tierkunde und Völkerkunde Dresden aufgenommen und vom damaligen Museum für Völkerkunde Rostock angekauft wurden.

Duration: 10.07.2020 – 10.11.2020

Funding: Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Researcher: Birgit Scheps-Bretschneider (Projektleitung), Isabelle Reimann, Mnyaka Sururu Mboro, Ulrike Kirsch und Sarah Fründt

Brief Description: Für die Ausstellung „Gesammelt, Gekauft, Geraubt?“ recherchierte das Weltkulturen Museum Fallbeispiele aus kolonialem und nationalsozialistischem Kontext. Hinsichtlich des kolonialen Kontexts wurden Objekte untersucht, die während der deutschen Kolonialzeit gesammelt oder durch deutsche Forscher/Siedler/Sammler in andern Kolonien um die Jahrhundertwende erworben wurden. Unter den Fallbeispielen befanden sich Objekte aus Kamerun, Namibia und Südafrika sowie aus Indonesien. Ein weiteres Thema waren Objekterwerbungen in den besetzten Gebieten während des Nationalsozialismus. Dabei ging es neben Fragen der Enteignung von Frankfurter Bürgern auch um die Rolle der Kunsthändler in Amsterdam und Paris. Die Ausstellung fand im Rahmen der Kooperation „Gekauft. Gesammelt. Geraubt? Vom Weg der Dinge ins Museum“ mit dem Historischen Museum Frankfurt, dem Museum Judengasse, dem Museum Angewandte Kunst und dem Fritz-Bauer-Institut statt.

Duration: 16.08.2018 – 27.01.2019

Publication: Gekauft. Gesammelt. Geraubt? Vom Weg der Dinge ins Museum. Dokumentation, Henrich Edition 2019.

Funding: Eigenmittel und Kooperationsfonds des Kulturamtes, Frankfurt am Main

Cooperation: Bas van Lier (Amsterdam, NL); Amathole Museum (King Williams Town, SA); Museum of Military History (Johannesburg, SA)

Researcher: Julia Friedel (Kustodin Afrika) und Vanessa von Gliszczynski (Kustodin Südostasien)

Link: www.weltkulturenmuseum.de/de/ausstellungen/archiv/10030

Brief Description: Provenienzforschung über eine kolonialzeitliche Sammlung aus Nordost-Neuguinea, die von Hans Meier (1876 – 1955), einem Techniker der Neuendettelsauer Mission, 1904/05 gesammelt und 1906 von dem Architekten Hans Höllerer durch das Museum erworben wurde. Der Sammler verarbeitete seine Erlebnisse in Neuguinea später in den 1920er Jahren in stark fiktionalisierter Form als Autor von Abenteuererzählungen in einschlägigen Groschenheften.

Duration: seit Ende 2017

Funding: Eigenmittel

Researcher: Matthias Claudius Hofmann (Kustos Ozeanien)

Link: www.weltkulturenmuseum.de/de/labor/forschung/11109

Brief Description: Ziel war die Aufarbeitung der knapp 600 Objekte umfassenden Südamerikasammlung, die das Weltkulturen Museum zu verschiedenen Zeitpunkten zwischen 1965 und 1986 von dem polnischen Sammler und Ethnologen Borys Malkin (1917 – 2009) erworben hat. Es handelt sich hauptsächlich um zeitgenössische Objekte von indigenen Gruppen aus dem südamerikanischen Tiefland, speziell aus Kolumbien, Bolivien, Brasilien und Paraguay. Über die meisten Objekte ist wenig bekannt, obwohl Malkin weltweit für seine sorgfältigen Objektdokumentationen geschätzt wurde.

Duration: 07.2018 – 06.2019

Funding: Eigenmittel

Researcher: Arno Holl (Volontär)

Publication: Holl, Arno. 2019: Soon nothing of the same kind can be obtained. Über die Turbulenzen im Leben des Sammlers Borys Malkin. In: Weltkulturen News 1: In Bewegung, Oktober 2019 – März 2020. S. 4-7.

Link: https://www.weltkulturenmuseum.de/de/sammlungen/amerikas/

Brief Description: Das Forschungs- und Ausstellungsprojekt Invisible Inventories geht der Frage nach, wie Objekte, die sich gegenwärtig im Besitz von Kulturinstitutionen im Globalen Norden befinden, für die heutige kenianische Gesellschaft zugänglich gemacht werden können. Invisible Inventories will afrikanische Perspektiven und Positionen ins Zentrum der Restitutionsdebatte stellen. Zwei Künstler_innenkollektive sowie Forscher_innen aus Kenia und Deutschland werden mit den National Museums of Kenya (NMK), dem Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum (RJM) in Köln und dem Weltkulturen Museum in Frankfurt am Main zusammenarbeiten, um im Zeitraum von September 2020 bis September 2021 eine Serie von drei Ausstellungen zu produzieren. Das Weltkulturen Museum setzt seinen Fokus dabei auf die Erforschung der hauseigenen Sammlung von Objekten aus Kenia.

Duration: 2018 – 2021

Funding: Kulturstiftung des Bundes

Kooperationen mit dem Goethe-Institut Kenia, Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum Köln, National Museum of Kenya, SHIFT Kollektiv, The Nest Collective

Researcher: Julia Friedel (Kustodin Afrika), Frauke Gathof (Volontärin) und Leonie Neumann (Volontärin)

Link: www.inventoriesprogramme.org

Brief Description: Das Museum Natur und Mensch verwahrt in seiner Ethnologischen Sammlung auch eine Vielzahl an Objekten aus Ozeanien. In den Jahren 2017 und 2018 wurde dieser Bestand digitalisiert. Dabei zeigte sich, dass mehr als 1.200 Sammlungsgegenstände im Zeitraum der deutschen Kolonialherrschaft in Ozeanien ans Museum kamen. Die Sammlung Brandeis besteht aus 279 Objekten, die der ehemalige kaiserliche Landeshauptmann Eugen Brandeis und seine Ehefrau Antonie vor allem auf den Marshallinseln und Samoa sammelten und 1901 dem damaligen Museum für Natur- und Völkerkunde vermachten.

Ziel des Forschungsprojekts ist zum einen, diesen Bestand ethnohistorisch zu untersuchen – nach Möglichkeit in Kooperation mit Partner_innen aus den Urhebergesellschaften. Zum anderen geht es darum, die Biografien und Sammlungstätigkeiten von Eugen und Antonie Brandeis aufzuarbeiten. Ein besonderes Augenmerk wird dabei auf Antonie liegen, die den Großteil der Sammlung verantwortet hat, in ihrer Rolle als Sammlerin jedoch weitgehend im Schatten ihres einflussreichen Mannes verblieb. Durch diesen doppelten Fokus leistet das Projekt einen Beitrag zur Aufarbeitung des Kultur- und Sammlungsgutes aus kolonialen Kontexten im deutschsprachigen Raum sowie des Wirkens zentraler Persönlichkeiten der deutschen Kolonialgeschichte

Duration: 2020 – 2021

Funding: Deutsches Zentrum Kulturgutverluste

Cooperation: Im Aufbau

Researcher: Godwin Kornes

Links: https://www.freiburg.de/pb/1576576.html

Brief Description: Die Ethnographische Sammlung des Oberhessischen Museums in Gießen und die Ethnographische Sammlung der Philipps-Universität Marburg werden in Kooperation Teilbestände ihrer Sammlungen auf verschiedene koloniale Kontexte hin erforschen. Der Bestand der Gießener Sammlung, die 1910 gegründet wurde, umfasst insbesondere aufgrund ihrer Entstehungszeit während der deutschen formalen Kolonialherrschaft eine Vielzahl von Objekten aus kolonialen Kontexten. Die Ethnographische Sammlung der Philipps-Universität Marburg wurde erst in den 1920er Jahren gegründet, umfasst aber ebenso Objekte aus kolonialen Kontexten, die insbesondere auf die Übernahme von Teilsammlungen aus anderen Sammlungen zurückzuführen sind.

Ziel des Forschungsprojektes ist zum einen die Rekonstruktion der Objektbiografien von ca. 60 Objekten aus der Region Ostafrika (insbesondere Tansania) und aus Kamerun. Zum anderen soll den sich andeutenden Verbindungen zwischen der Marburger und Gießener Sammlung nachgegangen werden. Es gilt diese Verbindungen insbesondere auf Personen hin zu untersuchen, die an der Entstehung und Entwicklung beider Sammlungen beteiligt waren, aber auch auf konkrete Verdachtsmomente, die sich bereits in der Projektvorbereitung abgezeichnet haben.
Das Projekt beabsichtigt nicht nur die Kooperation zwischen der Marburger und Gießener Sammlung, um Provenienzforschung zu Objekten aus kolonialen Kontext in Mittelhessen zu etablieren. Ebenso sollen Kooperationen mit VertreterInnen in Tansania und Kamerun aufgebaut werden, um einen vielseitigen Forschungsprozess zu gestalten, in den unterschiedliche Perspektiven einfließen. Das kooperative Forschungsprojekt stellt somit eine wesentliche Grundlage für zukünftige Forschungsvorhaben beider Sammlungen und in der Region Mittelhessen dar.

Die Forschungsergebnisse sollen sowohl auf der Website des Oberhessischen Museums Gießen als auch auf der Website der Ethnographischen Sammlung der Philipps-Universität Marburg in deutscher und englischer Sprache veröffentlicht werden.

Duration: November 2020 bis Oktober 2021

Funding: Deutsches Zentrum Kulturgutverluste.

Researcher: Katharina Weick-Joch, Manuela Rochholl, Ernst Halbmayer, Dagmar Schweitzer de Palacios

Link: https://www.kulturgutverluste.de/Webs/DE/Forschungsfoerderung/Projektfinder/Projektfinder_Formular.html?queryResultId=null&pageNo=0&pageLocale=de&view=renderJSON&cl2Categories_Themen=FBKK&docId=1373242

Brief Description: The dissertation project is designed as provenance research and focuses on the history of the impact of the Ethnographic Collection Göttingen from colonial contexts by analysing its documentation, use and interpretation history. University collections are understood as places with epistemological power, which have been and are still being interrelated with academic practices of teaching and research.

Duration: November 2019 – October 2021

Funding: Das Projekt ist Teil des Verbundprojekts „Provenienzforschung in außereuropäischen Sammlungen und der Ethnologie in Niedersachsen“ (PAESE) und wird von der VolkswagenStiftung gefördert.

Cooperation: Flower Manase (Nationalmuseum Tansania)

Researcher: Hannah Feder, Michael Kraus und Elfriede Hermann

Link: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/paese/teilprojekte/collecting-and-teaching/

Brief Description: This subproject primarily deals with Tjurunga, the secret-sacred ceremonial Objects of the Australian Aboriginal People, which are housed in the collections at the State Museum Hanover and at Lutheran Mission society at Hermannsburg, and which were likely collected in Australia and brought to the state of Lower Saxony in the late 19th and early 20th century.

Duration: Dezember 2020 – February 2021

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation

Cooperation: PAESE – Subproject: Provenances of Tjurunga at the Landesmuseum Hanover and the Collection Hermannsburg

Researcher: Josefine Neef (Projektmitarbeiterin), Michael Kraus

Link: https://www.uni-goettingen.de/de/document/download/05477b515e42397562fbe2574cd3cd8d.pdf/Neef_2021_Tjurunga%20in%20der%20Ethnologischen%20Sammlung%20der%20Georg-August-Universita%CC%88t%20Go%CC%88ttingen.pdf

Brief Description: The ethnological collection of the Georg-August-University of Göttingen is home to a large number of objects that can be assigned to a colonial context. The PhD project aims to take a closer look at international trade routes and networks in which the collection holdings in Göttingen today were integrated. It will look at individual objects from the former German South Sea colonies that were collected on site between 1890 and 1914. People such as Richard Thurnwald, Adolf Roesicke, Franz Boluminski or Arthur Speyer are associated with these objects. The following questions are of interest: How was knowledge generated in a colonial context? What role did objects play in this? Who acquired objects? What did aquisition practices look like in the country of origin, in Europe and in Göttingen? Who participated in this process?

Duration: October 2018 – September 2021

Funding: The project is part of the joint project "Provenance Research in Non-European Collections and Ethnology in Lower Saxony" (PAESE) and is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

Cooperation: Tommy Buga (National Museum and Art Gallery PNG)

Researcher: Sara Müller, Rebekka Habermas, Michael Kraus and Elfriede Hermann

Links: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/paese/teilprojekte/trade-routes-and-networks/

Brief Description: The project focuses on the animals and ethnographica that were circulated in the 19th and 20th centuries by the animal trading companies of Carl Reiche and Ludwig Ruhe, which operated internationally from Alfeld. The aim is to trace the global routes and networks through which zoologica as well as ethnographica, and with them sometimes people, reached various places and institutions in Europe. Using a global micro-history approach, the project is set to highlight the global entanglements of this trade with animals (and also humans) that was situated in Alfeld. It further researches the largely unexplored connections of collector and trade networks of zoologica as well as their correlation with ethnographica and so-called "Völkerschauen" („human zoos“).

Duration: January 2021 – December 2022

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation

Participating institutions: Georg-August University of Göttingen , in cooperation with the museum of the city of Alfeld and with support from Netzwerk Provenienzforschung in Niedersachsen (Provenance Research Network in Lower Saxony)

Researcher: Charlotte Hoes, Rebekka Habermas

Links: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/ap-alfeld-the-global-networks-of-the-animal-trading-companies-reiche-and-ruhe-provenance-research-on-the-circulation-of-animals-humans-and-objects-in-the-19th-and-20th-centuries/#c2803

Brief Description: The research project is dedicated to the provenances of early collections of the Museum am Rothenbaum (MARKK) connected to the international networks of Hamburg merchants at the end of the nineteenth century. The focus of the investigations throughout the first year was on the origin and circumstances of acquisition of significant collections from West Africa. Similar work will be conducted throughout the next two years for holdings that stem from Oceania and were acquired in the context of trade, with an eye to connections of colonial contexts of injustice.
The collections studied during the first year of the project were selected due to their component objects, their connections to trade at the end of the nineteenth century, that were particularly suitable to reveal underlying structures, and from which further analytical approaches could be developed. A large part of the MARKK’S West African holdings accessioned by the early twentieth century came via the family members of important trading and shipping companies or from individuals who, up to this point, were only known by the name recorded in the museum inventory. These individuals were the focus of the first year of research. In addition to the historical contextualization of the acquisition circumstances, the project further aimed to create an expandable frame of reference for further provenance research at the MARKK and other German museums.
Building on this, collections from Oceania are to be examined more closely in the next two years in an extension of the geographical framework, and with a focus on the former German colonial territories. Here, too, the historical context forms the starting point for researching the collections that the former Museum für Völkerkunde obtained via transaction partners from the Hamburg trading environment, such as “Hernsheim & Co.” or the so-called “Jaluit-Gesellschaft”.
The results of the research project, now extended by two years, will be incorporated into the MARKK’s new permanent exhibition, where the collection’s connections with Hamburg’s world trade and the provenance research conducted on it will play an important role. Additionally, the research results will be published on the museum’s website and in various portals of colonial provenance research. It is also planned to publish the results in a scientific journal issued by the museum. Depending on the results of the research on the acquisition circumstances of the respective collection objects, joint steps (e.g. restitutions) are to be planned in cooperation with local partners.

Duration: July 1, 2020 until June 30, 2023

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation

Cooperation: For local research on holdings originating from the Nigerian coastal area, the MARKK is in contact with Dr Babajide Ololajulo, Senior Lecturer in Cultural Anthropology at the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Ibadan. Richard Tsogang Fossi is a Fellow at the MARKK and works on the provenance and local significance of the museum's Cameroonian holdings. The results of his research will be included in an exhibition project funded by the Kulturstiftung des Bundes, in which the MARKK also collaborates with Princess Marilyn Douala Manga Bell, the great granddaughter of Rudolf Manga Bell.

At the end of October/beginning of November 2022, a workshop organized in cooperation with Prof. Dr. Michi Knecht (University of Bremen) will take place at the MARKK, where early results and perspectives of the project will be discussed in cooperation with representatives from Papua New Guinea, among others.

Researcher: Jamie Dau (Provenance Researcher)

Links: https://markk-hamburg.de/en/category/provenance-research/

Brief Description: The Landesmuseum Hannover is initially focusing on two important collections from Cameroon within the framework of the project: From the colonial officer Wilko von Frese, who was stationed in Dschang between 1908 and 1910, the Landesmuseum is holding 167 objects from the so-called Grassfields of Cameroon. The various acquisition strategies of the collector and, in particular, the context of the acquisitions will be examined. In addition, the provenance of a collection purchased through the ethnographic dealer Julius Konietzko in 1930 will be investigated. According to the dealer, the objects were requisitioned in a punitive expedition of the Governor Jesko von Puttkamer in Bamenda in 1911. However, initial examinations have shown that von Puttkamer was no longer in Cameroun at the time stated. The context of violence and the erroneous provenance of these objects will be examined in order to reconstruct the biographies, the production of knowledge and the change of meaning of the objects.

Duration: 09.2018 – 09.2021

Funding: The project is part of the joint project "Provenance Research in Non-European Collections and Ethnology in Lower Saxony" (PAESE) and is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

Cooperation: Paule Dassi (curator at the Palace Museum Batoufam), Albert Gouaffo (University Dschang)

Researcher: Bianca Baumann and Claudia Andratschke

Link: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/paese/teilprojekte/conditions-of-acquisitions-in-colonial-cameroon/  https://www.landesmuseum-hannover.de/forschungsprojekte/fp-3/ 

Brief Description: The exhibition "Difficult legacy. Remnants of Colonialism today" dealt with the colonial entanglement of the museum’s collection. The first results of the provenance research on ethnographic and natural history objects were presented. The exhibition pursued an actor-oriented approach and took a close look at the collectors to contextualise the respective object acquisitions. At the same time, the agency of the colonised was included by addressing the persistent resistance in all German colonies, thus enabling a multi-perspective reading. The second part of the exhibition was dedicated to the post-colonial situation and ongoing colonial structures today. Contemporary art from Hawai'i, for example, pointed out the country's continued dependence on the USA. At the end of the tour, the contemporary way of dealing with this difficult legacy was addressed, and questions and limits of provenance research were pointed out.

Publication: Poser, Alexis von und Bianca Baumann (Hrsg.): Heikles Erbe. Koloniale Spuren bis in die Gegenwart. Dresden: Sandstein 2016.

Duration: 09.2016 – 02.2017

Funding: Landesmuseum Hannover / Land Niedersachsen

Cooperation: Healoha Johnston (Honolulu Museum of Art); Wazi Apoh (University of Ghana)

Researcher: Alexis von Poser, Bianca Baumann, Claudia Andratschke and Christiane Schilling

Brief Description: The project focuses on Ernst Ohlmer (1847–1925) to whom the museum owes its collection of Chinese porcelain – one of the most outstanding in Europe, as most of the porcelains were produced in the imperial workshops. In that context, it is important to note that the ceramics are not so-called export porcelain made for the European market. The collection at the Hildesheim museum rather reflects the taste of the Chinese elite of the time, including the imperial court. Ohlmer acquired part of his porcelain collection from Max von Brandt who was the Prussian envoy in China from 1875 until 1893. Ohlmer, in turn, was employed with the Chinese Imperial Maritime Custom Service from 1868 onward and became one of the local directors of that agency in 1887. He continued to be active in the Maritime Custom Service until his retirement in 1914. One of the main objectives of the project is to shed light on the extent to which Ohlmer may have benefitted from the political destabilization of the Chinese Empire due to European interventions, most importantly the Opium Wars (1839–1842, 1856–1860, looting of the Old Summer Palace in 1860), when compiling his collection.

Duration: 1 June 2022 – 31 May 2023

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation, with additional funding by the Stiftung Niedersächsischer Volksbanken und Raiffeisenbanken, the Volksbank Hildesheim-Lehrte-Pattensen and the Netzwerk Provenienzforschung in Niedersachsen.

Researchers: Dr. Sabine Lang, Sabine Hesemann M.A.; project supervisor: Dr. Andrea Nicklisch

Links: https://kulturgutverluste.de/en/projects/chinese-art-collections-ernst-ohlmer-and-max-von-brandt-contribution-history-collecting

Brief Description: Provenance research on ethnographic objects from Africa, the Americas, India, Indonesia, and Oceania, which came from the Berlin Royal Museum of Ethnography to what was then the Hildesheim City Museum/Roemer-Museum at the turn of the 19th/20th centuries. The majority of these objects were collected in colonial contexts. The project aimed at shedding light on the circumstances under which the objects in question were collected. Another focus was on the compilation of collectors’ biographies. Results of that project were presented at the Roemer- und Pelizaeus-Museum from 31 May 2019 until 12 January 2020 in the exhibition “Den Sammlern auf der Spur” (“On the Trail of the Collectors”).

Duration: February 2017 – January 2018

Publications: Lang, Sabine und Nicklisch, Andrea: Den Sammlern auf der Spur: Provenienzforschung zu kolonialen Kontexten am Roemer- und Pelizaeus- Museum Hildesheim 2017/18 (mit einem Beitrag von Tristan Oestermann). Herausgegeben von Claudia Andratschke. Heidelberg: arthistoricum.net, 2021 (Veröffentlichungen des Netzwerks Provenienzforschung in Niedersachsen, Band 2). https://books.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/arthistoricum/catalog/book/

Funding: Niedersächsische Sparkassenstiftung & Sparkasse Hildesheim Goslar Peine

Researchers: Sabine Lang and Andrea Nicklisch

Link: https://rpmuseum.de/

Brief Description: One focus of the project is the extensive network established by museum co-founder Hermann Roemer (1816–1894). It was due to his connections that ethnographic collections came to Hildesheim from the mid-19th century onward, some of them predating the emergence of the German colonies in Africa, China, and Oceania. These collections include objects from Namibia (Carl Hoepfner collection, 1882–1884) as well as from Oceania (Museum Godeffroy Hamburg, objects purchased by the Hildesheim museum in the late 1870s/early 1880s) and Indonesia (collection of Hermann Muhlert, military surgeon in the Dutch East Indies, objects donated to the museum in 1862/1863). Another focus is on shedding light on the circumstances under which these collections were compiled, about which little is known in many cases.

Duration: 1 November 2018 – 31 October 2021

Funding: The project is part of the joint project “Provenance Research in Non-European Collections and Ethnology in Lower Saxony” (PAESE) which is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

Cooperations: Nzila Marina Mubusisi (National Museum of Namibia, Windhoek), Werner Hillebrecht (Museums Association of Namibia)

Researcher: Sabine Lang

Links: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/en/paese/teilprojekte/reconstruction-of-collection-biographies-and-regional-networks/?lang=en&cHash=383c6016b40023eb48efc0993254568c; https://rpmuseum.de/

Brief Description: Das Projekt „Recherche zur Provenienz eines Schädels aus Ostafrika und zu einem verschollenen Dokumentenbestand (Sammlung Lothar von Trotha)“ will die Herkunft eines menschlichen Schädels aus Ostafrika aus der Sammlung Lothar von Trothas klären. Als Kommandeur der "Kaiserlichen Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Südwestafrika" trug Trotha die Hauptverantwortung für den ersten Genozid des 20. Jahrhunderts. Wenig bekannt ist, dass Lothar v. Trotha auch in anderen Brennpunkten des Deutschen Kolonialreiches im Einsatz war, so auch in den 1890er Jahren im dem damaligen „Deutsch-Ost-Afrika“. Unter welchen Umständen ist der Schädel in die Sammlung von Trotha gelangt? Können wir vielleicht sogar etwas über die Identität der/des Verstorbenen erfahren? Lassen sich im Museumsarchiv erwähnte verschollene Dokumente finden, die Aufschluss darüber geben? Das Projekt, dem umfangreiche Quellen aus dem Privatbesitz der Familie von Trotha erstmals zur Sichtung vorliegen, will zur weiteren Erforschung der deutschen Kolonialgeschichte und zur postkolonialen Provenienzforschung beitragen.

Duration: 1.1.2022 – 30.6.2022

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation

Cooperation: National Museum and House of Culture in Dar es Salaam, Decolonize Cologne, Berlin Postkolonial

Researcher: Christine Hardung (RJM), Matthias Häussler, Clara Himmelheber (RJM)

Link: www.museenkoeln.de/rautenstrauch-joest-museum/Forschung

Brief Description: The research and exhibition project Invisible Inventories explores how objects currently held by cultural institutions in the Global North can be made accessible to contemporary Kenyan society. Invisible Inventories aims to place African perspectives and positions at the centre of the debate on provenance and restitution. For this purpose, two artist collectives and researchers from Kenya as well as Germany are working together with the National Museums of Kenya (NMK), the Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum (RJM) in Cologne and the Weltkulturen Museum in Frankfurt am Main.
The project includes, among other things, a database of over 32,000 objects from Kenya held by institutions in the Global North (as of February 2021) and a discussion series that provides a platform for public engagement with restitution issues. The exhibition project Invisible Inventories will be developed collectively by the members and presented at NMK (03/2021), RJM (05/2021) and WKM (10/2021).

Duration: 2018 – 2021

Funding: Kulturstiftung des Bundes, Goethe-Institut e.V. Excellence Initiative

Cooperation: Goethe-Institut Kenya, National Museums of Kenya, SHIFT Kollektiv (Frankreich/Deutschland), The Nest Collective (Kenya)

Researchers: Goethe-Institut Nairobi: Anisha Soff, Sheila Akwany; National Museums of Kenya: Lydia Nafula, Philemon Nyamanga, Juma Ondeng‘, Njeri Gachihi; Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum: Clara Himmelheber; SHIFT Kollektiv: Sam Hopkins, Marian Nur Goni, Simon Rittmeier; The Nest Collective: Jim Chuchu, Njoki Ngumi; Weltkulturen Museum: Julia Friedel, Frauke Gathof, Leonie Neumann

Link: https://www.inventoriesprogramme.org/

Brief Description: Under the title Pacific Presences, scholars from various disciplines as well as artists and representatives from origin groups are researching Oceanic collections in Europe. The project was supported by European funds and is under the direction of the Cambridge Museum for Archaeology and Anthropology as well as the University of Cambridge. The RJM holds part of the collection from the H.M.S. Royalist (1890-93) expedition under Admiral Davis. The objects for Pacific Presences were photographed, combined with artefacts from other museums and handed over to representatives of the Pacific state of Kiribati. Additionally, works were produced that were shown at the 9th Asia Pacific Triennial in Brisbane, Australia, which create a connection from yesterday to today.

Publications: Clark, Alison 2019: Resonant Histories. Pacific artefacts and the voyages of HMS Royalist 1890-1893 (Pacific Presences, 6)

Duration: 2013 – 2018

Funding: European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) / ERC grant agreement n° [324146]11

Cooperation: Kiribati

Researchers: Ali Clark (Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge), Oliver Lueb (RJM)

Link: http://pacificpresences.maa.cam.ac.uk/

Brief Description: An extensive catalogue of Palauan artefacts in Europe was created through the collaboration of 15 European museums, including the RJM. Most of the objects do not exist anymore today on the Palauan Islands and the knowledge of how they were produced has been forgotten. Apart from the materials and production techniques, the research has also highlighted who the collectors were and the circumstances under which the objects were acquired. As it turns out, the Palauan objects were not spoils of war from the German colonial period nor were they acquired violently. The influence of various anthropologists, civil servants and traders on Palauan society also becomes clear.

Publications: Etpison, Mandy Thijssen and Constanze Dupont (eds.). 2017. Palau in Europe. Palau: Etpison Museum.

Duration: 2016-2017

Cooperation: Palau

Researchers: Constanze Dupont (Etpison Museum, Koror, Palau), Oliver Lueb (RJM)

Link: www.etpisonmuseum.org

Brief Description: Under the Karanga Aotearoa Repatriation Programme the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is coordinating the repatriation of human remains from international institutions to the relevant Māori-Tribes (iwi). During the years 1969-1975 the RJM published material about a mummified and tattooed human head (toi moko) in its own collection and in 1969 lent it to the Nagoya City Art Museum in Japan for their exhibition on “Art of the Peoples of the World”. In June 2017 the RJM contacted a delegation of the Te Papa Museum to initiate the repatriation of the toi moko. After the official decision of the city council of the City of Cologne on 20.3.2018 and the subsequent clarification of the Māori-protocol the toi moko was repatriated on 26.6.2018.

Duration: Until 2018

Cooperation: Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

Researchers: Oliver Lueb (RJM), Te Herekiekie Herewini (Te Papa)

Link: https://www.tepapa.govt.nz/international-repatriation

Brief Description: How could a kind of provenance research look like that not only deals with the how of object provenance, but also the why? This project attempts to answer this question using the extensive archive of ethnologist Wilhelm Joest. In his diaries, Joest describes his often contradictory relationship to the objects he collected, of which today more than 5,000 remain in various European museums. Joest’s longing, desire and disgust reveal a relationship between collector and objects and creator communities that, beyond purely scientific or aesthetic considerations, points to the deeply intimate meaning of collecting in the colonial era. Inspired by anthropologist Ann Laura Stoler's theoretical reflections on "colonial intimacies", this project aims to develop an approach to make these intimacies of colonial collecting visible. This is intended to create a new perspective on provenance research that not only reveals the material history of an object but also its emotional entanglement in the colonial social order, thus revealing further possibilities for the decolonisation of ethnographic collections in addition to restitution.

Duration: 2019 – 2023

Funding: Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, Museumsgesellschaft RJM e.V.

Cooperation: University of Amsterdam – School of Historical Studies

Researcher: Carl Deußen

Brief Description: The RJM wants to meet the challenge of a comprehensive disclosure of its holdings. As a first step, the entire collection will systematically be reviewed by a research trainee to verify the current state of knowledge on provenances as well as to add new information.
Based on the results, further steps will follow, such as prioritizing the holdings for in-depth research, expanding cooperation with creator communities and engaging in further exchange with other museums. The results also serve as a contribution to the overall research landscape, for example in the form of publications, but also as a basis for an in-house concept of how to share this knowledge.

Duration: 2020 – 2022

Funding: Ministerium für Kultur und Wissenschaft des Landes NRW im Rahmen des Förderprogramms "Forschungsvolontariat Kunstmuseen NRW", Museumsgesellschaft RJM e.V.

Cooperation: University of Amsterdam – School of Historical Studies

Researcher: Yagmur Karakis 

Brief Description: Das Thema der Dissertation sind die Bestände aus Zentralafrika in der Völkerkundesammlung der Hansestadt Lübeck. Ungefähr 262 Objekte aus Äquatorialguinea, Gabun sowie angrenzenden Gebieten in Süd-Kamerun und der Republik Kongo werden hier aufbewahrt, die von Lübeckern und anderen Sammler_innen zwischen den 19. und 21. Jahrhundert gesammelt wurden. Besonders bedeutend ist die Sammlung der Lübecker Pangwe-Expedition (1907-1909), von der jetzt nur ca. 168 Objekte erhalten sind und zu der Tagebücher und Veröffentlichungen des Expeditionsleiters Günther Tessmann existieren. An dieser Stelle ist zu erwähnen, dass die Zerstörung des Lübeckers Museums ca. 85% dieser Sammlung verloren gegangen sind. Darüber hinaus spielen die Forschungsergebnisse Günther Tessmanns in historischen und ethnologischen Beiträgen ins Besondere zu dem Volk der Pangwe oder Fang bis heute eine große Rolle. An diesem Punkt der Analyse ist hervorzuheben, dass die Sammlung Tessmanns zum Teil unter unethischen Bedingungen zusammengetragen wurde. Deshalb ist eine kritische Analyse des verbliebenen Bestandes auch im Hinblick auf mögliche Restitutionen angebracht. Ebenso gilt es aber neben der Rückführung von Objekten auch über eine Partnerschaft im Sinne eines Austauchen von Wissen nachzudenken. Als Wissenschaftlerin aus Gabun möchte ich zu einer Neubewertung dieser Objekte aus einer modernen, afrikanischen Perspektive beitragen. Mich interessiert die Frage, welche Bedeutung die Lübecker Sammlung für eine Rekonstruktion von historischem und kulturellem Wissen haben kann.  Zunächst stellt sich die Frage, welches Wissen über die Ursprungskulturen sich aus den Objekten und Dokumenten der Lübecker Sammlung gewinnen lässt. Diese Frage sollte durch die Dokumente, die ich hier in der Völkerkundesammlung der Hansestadt Lübeck, im Stadtarchiv und in der Stadtbibliothek finde, aber auch durch eine eingehende Analyse der Untersuchungsobjekte selbst. Dann folgen den Fragen, was den Sammlern/-innen verborgen geblieben ist und was nach Ansicht von afrikanischen Nachfahren und Fachleuten übersehen wurde. Zur Beantwortung dieser Fragen wird im Sommer 2020 eine Feldforschung durchgeführt. In derselben Richtung folgen den wichtigen Fragen dieses Dissertationsprojekts, nämlich, welche Bedeutung dieses Wissens für eine Revitalisierung und eine Neuerfindung der Tradition in der postmodernen, globalisierten, heutigen afrikanischen Gesellschaft haben könnte und welche Rolle dabei Fragen von Restitution und (Post)-Kolonialismus spielen.

Duration: ab Sommersemester 2019

Funding: Zentrum für Wissenschaftliche Forschung Lübeck (ZKFL) and German Lost Art Foundation

Cooperations: Université Omar Bongo / LUTO (Laboratoire universitaire de la tradition orale et des dynamiques contemporaines. Libreville)

Researcher: Drossilia Dikegue Igouwe (Projektbearbeiterin), Lars Frühsorge (Leiter der Völkerkundesammlung Lübeck) and Michael Schütte

Links: https://vks.die-luebecker-museen.de; https://www.uni-luebeck.de/forschung/forschungsprofil/weitere-forschungsbereiche/kulturwissenschaften-und-wissenskulturen-zkfl.html; https://www.kulturgutverluste.de/Webs/DE/Start/Index.html

Brief Description: The Ethnographic Collection of the Hanseatic City of Lübeck conducts proactive provenance research, which is not a response to existing restitution claims but part of a self-set agenda to critically investigate all problematic holdings. Since December 1st 2019, two prominent holdings of the Völkerkundesammlung are subjects of a 12-month provenance project, which is mainly financed by the German Lost Art Foundation.
One of these holdings are 72 objects of the Herero from what is today Namibia, which were collected by two officers, two staff surgeons of the colonial German Schutztruppe, and a nurse. These objects were entered the Collection between 1906 and 1945, partly as donations and partly as an estate. It will be investigated whether these clothings, jewellery, tools and weapons are related to the genocide of the Herero and Nama (1904-1908). The identification of the human remains, which are part of this holding, is of particular importance.
However, at the heart of this project is the collection of the Lübecker Pangwe-Expedition to Central Africa (1907-1909) that is considered the most valuable and culturally as well as historically important collection of the Völkerkundesammlung. The diaries of this expedition prove that the collected objects changed hands mainly as purchases and gifts, but in some cases also in exchange for hostages or by raids on non-cooperative villages. Only 158 of the originally around 1,200 objects survived the bombing of the Museum during World War II. One of the main questions of this project is whether it is still possible to identify looted goods in the remaining collection.
In addition to the preparation of possible restitutions, this project focuses on cooperation with the source communities and the return of knowledge. Experts from the countries of origin will be involved and catalogues of the examined objects in the respective national language will be accessible online and shared to all interested parties.In addition to the historian Michael Schütte, who is responsible for archival research, Drossilia Dikegue Igouwe, a researcher from Central Africa, is working on this project. She will carry out ethnographic fieldwork in the summer of 2020 in order to gather new information about the objects and to initiate a dialogue with the source communities. With a scholarship from the Zentrum für Kulturwissenschaftliche Forschung Lübeck, she is also preparing a dissertation on the entire holdings from Central Africa in Lübeck.

Duration: December 2019 – incl. November 2020

Project Funding: Center for Cultural Studies Research Lübeck (ZKFL) and German Lost Art Foundation (DZK)

Reseracher: Lars Frühsorge (Leiter der Völkerkundesammlung Lübeck), Michael Schütte (Projektmitarbeiter), Drossilia Dikegue Igouwe (Assoziierte Mitarbeiterin)

Link: vks.die-luebecker-museen.de

Brief Description: Ziel des Projekts ist eine möglichst detaillierte Erforschung der Erwerbungskontexte der Sammlung Max von Stettens. Die durch sechs „Schenkungen“ erworbene Sammlung stammt aus der frühen Phase der Inbesitznahme Kameruns durch das Deutsche Kaiserreich und befindet sich seit den 1890er-Jahren im Münchner ethnologischen Museum. Im Vordergrund des Projekts steht die Frage nach der Art der Erwerbssituationen und den Erwerbungsorten der über 200 Inventarnummern umfassenden Sammlung Max von Stettens bei gleichzeitiger Berücksichtigung der Positionen und Aktivitäten des Sammlers, der Führer der Polizeitruppe und dann Kommandeur der „Schutztruppe“ in Kamerun war. Exemplarisch soll zudem an der Person Max von Stetten und seiner Sammlung die geteilte Geschichte zwischen Deutschland und Kamerun in dieser frühen Phase kolonialer Expansion erarbeitet werden. Ein wesentlicher Bestandteil des Forschungsprojekts ist eine intensive Zusammenarbeit mit wissenschaftlichen Partnern_innen in Kamerun und dortigen Herkunftsgemeinschaften.

Duration: 1.11.2019 – 31.10.2020

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation; Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Wissenschaft und Kunst

Researcher: Albert Goauffo (Coordinator Cameroon), Yrène Matchinda (Mitarbeiterin frankophone Teile der Sammlung), Jospeh Ebune (Mitarbeiter anglophone Teile der Sammlung)

Link: https://kulturgutverluste.de/en/projects/blue-rider-post-and-max-von-stetten-collection-1893-1896-cameroon-museum-funf-kontinente

Brief Description: The PAESE project at the State Museum Nature and Man Oldenburg investigates the origin – the provenance – and the acquisition circumstances of ethnological objects from colonial contexts. Under the working title "Colonial Collecting Strategies in Military Contexts” of the corresponding PhD thesis, the focus is on the collection of the Langheld brothers (Wilhelm, Johannes and Friedrich, established in a period of 1889-1901). Based on the Langheld brothers' collection, the spectrum of acquisition and collection circumstances in colonial contexts (gift, loot, purchase) can be examined and demonstrated. Connected with this is the question of the extent to which contexts of injustice can be reconstructed from it. A regional focus is on the territory of present-day Tanzania. The aim is to generate a transparent overview of the Oldenburg holdings and to link the results of provenance research with these digital holdings. The results will be made available to scholars worldwide via the project database. The State Museum Nature and Man Oldenburg is committed to a dialogical, transparent and open-ended exchange with members of the societies of origin.

Duration: 2018 – 2021

Funding: The project is part of the joint project "Provenance Research in Non-European Collections and Ethnology in Lower Saxony" (PAESE) and is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

Researchers: Jennifer Tadge (State Museum Nature and Man Oldenburg), www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/jennifer-tadge/; Head of the Subproject: Ursula Warnke (State Museum Nature and Man Oldenburg); UAcademic Adviser: Dagmar Freist (Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg, Institute for History), https://uol.de/geschichte-der-fruehen-neuzeit/

Links: https://www.postcolonial-provenance-research.com/paese/teilprojekte/sammelpraktiken-in-militaerischen-kontexten; www.naturundmensch.de

Brief Description: The project conducts interdisciplinary anthropological and historical research on 30 human skulls from outside Europe to clarify if they have a colonial background. The skulls are on the one hand examined with noninvasive anthropological methods, on the other hand archival material concerning the history of acquisition is evaluated historically. The combination of both ways of analysis shall enable in an ideal case to give back the biography to the human beings. Furthermore, the gained knowledge should add to enhance the attitude within the museum for proper handling of human remains. In imparting this attitude outwards, it can reach more and more people.

Duration: 01.12.2019 – 30.11.2021

Funding: German Lost Art Foundation

Reseracher: Marianne Kupetz and Ivonne Kaiser

Brief Description: Vor dem Hintergrund eines geplanten Neubaus stellt sich das Linden-Museum den Fragen, welche gesellschaftliche Rolle ein ethnologisches Museum in der Zukunft spielt, wie die eigene koloniale Geschichte angemessen aufgearbeitet werden kann und wie Sammlungen zukünftig zugänglich gemacht und präsentiert werden. Ziel des Projekts ist die Fortführung und Erweiterung der bereits begonnenen Auseinandersetzung des Linden-Museums mit seiner kolonialen Vergangenheit und seiner postkolonialen Gegenwart. In acht partizipativen Labs mit unterschiedlichen regionalen Schwerpunkten wird die Vorstellung des Museums als objektive Institution der Wissensvermittlung hinterfragt und neue Formen der Präsentation entwickelt, die Vielstimmigkeit zulassen und Dialog ermöglichen. Dabei ist die Provenienzforschung ein integraler Bestandteil aller Labs. Außerdem ist dem Thema der Provenienzforschung und den Möglichkeiten ihrer Vermittlung ein eigenes Lab gewidmet.

Duration: 2019 – 2021

Funding: Kulturstiftung des Bundes

Cooperations: unter anderem mit Kayah und Kayaw (Myanmar), Mapuche (Chile)

Researcher: Henrike Hoffmann, Markus Himmelsbach

Link:https://www.lindenmuseum.de/

Brief Description: In der Kooperation des Linden-Museums mit der Universität Tübingen, dem namibischen Nationalmuseum, der Universität von Namibia, der Museum Association of Namibia sowie Vertretern der NGO Heritage Watch, der Ovaherero Genocide Foundation, und des Maherero Royal House, sollen neue Formen der Präsentation der gemeinsamen Geschichte entwickelt werden. Ziel ist, einen langfristigen Dialog zu etablieren und dabei Wissen, Erfahrungen und Interpretationen auszutauschen. Im Mittelpunkt des Projektes stehen die Sammlungen, historische Fotos und Dokumente, die aus der Region der ehemaligen deutschen Kolonie „Deutsch-Südwestafrika“ bzw. dem heutigen Staat Namibia stammen. Seit 2016 werden die Bestände aus Namibia von Provenienzforschern untersucht. Die Bestände aus Namibia sollen zudem im Rahmen der Namibia-Initiative digital erfasst und damit zugänglich gemacht werden.

Duration: 2019 – 2021

Funding: Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst Baden-Württemberg

Cooperations: unter anderem mit der University of Namibia, National Museum of Namibia, Museum Association of Namibia, Heritage Watch, Ovaherero Genocide Foundation, Maherero Royal House, Universität Tübingen

Researcher: Sandra Ferracuti, Christoph Rippe

Links: https://www.lindenmuseum.de/; https://www.baden-wuerttemberg.de/de/service/presse/pressemitteilung/pid/namibia-initiative-des-landes-2/

Brief Description: In 1907, Harry von Schoenermarck, a former student of the German Colonial School in Witzenhausen, brought a "Hottentot skull" he had so named to Germany and donated it to the "Museum" of the German Colonial School in May 1908. In 2014, the existence of this skull was brought to the attention of the Namibian Embassy and the Federal Foreign Office and it was announced that restitution was intended. Subsequently, a historical-anthropological provenance investigation was carried out.
The anthropological expert’s report showed that the skull was likely to be that of a Nama-speaking female of African origin, who died when she wasaround 20 years old. The historical expert opinion shows various possible acquisition contexts in the period from 1902 to 1907, whereby it is very likely that the sender, Harry von Schoenermark, took possession of the skull long after the death of the person, so that the sex of the person was no longer clearly identifiable. In Witzenhausen, the skull was put on display in 1940 in its own glass cabinet together with other objects of African origin in what was described as the "Africa room". It was an exhibition object of the German Colonial School until it was put into storage at the Ethnological Museum, sometime between 1963 and 1976.
In 2016, the Kassel artist Linda-J. Knop installed a memorial object entitled "Zur Erde sollst du zu Erde werden du werden" (To the Earth you shall become) in the exhibition of the Ethnological Museum Witzenhausen. Even after the skull was returned, it visibly indicates that for over a hundred years a part of a person from another cultural area was held in Germany without consent.
In 2017 a 40-page booklet entitled, "The Trace of the Skull" was published, which explains the provenance of the skull and its use in Witzenhausen. An English version of the brochure was published in 2019 with both print and online versions.
In August 2018, the skull, together with other human remains from other German institutions, was handed over to a Namibian delegation at a ceremony in Berlin and subsequently returned to Namibia.

Duration: 2014 – 2019

Funding: Thyssen Foundation 8000 Euro, DITSL funds 8000 Euro

Cooperation: Establishing contact with the Museum Association of Namibia for cooperation in future provenance research projects.

Researcher: Christian Hülsebusch (Geschäftsführer des DITSL), Marion Hulverscheidt (Wissenschaftshistorikerin, freie Mitarbeiterin des DITSL) und Holger Stoecker (Historiker, Berlin)

Link: https://ditsl.org/de/kultur-kunst/ethnographische-sammlung

Brief Description: Following the repatriation of a human skull to Namibia (see Trace of the Skull, duration: 2014-2018), this project deals with indexing & digitising objects in the collection that originated in Southern Africa, especially Namibia. This part of the collection is comprised of about 230 objects, the oldest of which were added to the collection around 1910. In addition to the (re-)identification of the objects, groundwork for a comprehensive provenance research will include researching well-known collectors, describing the history of the collection and digitally recording and documenting the objects/exhibits with photography, video and 3D scans. The aim of this project is to make the collection usable for future provenance research projects and to make the available knowledge visible to encourage future cooperation with other institutions and interested scholars.

Duration: 2019 – 2020

Funding: DITSL/ Foundation “Völkerkundliches Museum Witzenhausen“

Cooperation: Museums Association of Namibia

Researchers: Martin Nadarzinski (MA student of Ethnology, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main) and Klaus Schaller (Archivist and Photographer, Foundation of the Ethnological Museum, Witzenhausen)

Link: https://ditsl.org/de/kultur-kunst/ethnographische-sammlung

Brief Description: Dieses Teilprojekt gehört in ein umfassendes Forschungsprojekt mit dem Titel „Hans Himmelheber – Kunst Afrikas und verflochtene Wissensproduktion”. Ausgangspunkt ist das bisher noch kaum erforschte “Archiv” des Kunstethnologen und Sammlers Hans Himmelheber (1908–2003), dessen Theorien zur Künstlerpersönlichkeit einen Paradigmenwechsel für das Studium der materiellen Kultur Afrikas eingeleitet haben.  Das Teilprojekt zur Provenienzforschung befasst sich explizit mit der Erforschung von Kunsterwerbung und Marktmechanismen in kolonialen und in postkolonialen Strukturen in der Côte d’Ivoire (Baule, Dan, Guro, Senufo u.a.). Himmelheber war insgesamt zehn Mal im Zeitraum zwischen den 1933 und 1976 in der Côte d’Ivoire, publizierte sehr viel und sammelte und handelte im Auftrag von Museen, Sammlern und Galerien. Das Projekt verspricht Ergebnisse zu Zusammenhängen zwischen der wissenschaftlichen Erforschung der Kunst Afrikas, dem Kunsthandel sowie der westlichen Sammlungs-, Ausstellungs- und Museumspolitik.

Duration: 1.11.2018 – 31.10.2022

Funding: Förderung durch den Schweizerischen Nationalfonds (SNF) sowie Eigenmittel

Cooperations: Musée des Civilisations de la Côte d’Ivoire, Abidjan (Sylvie Memel Kassi); Centre Culturel des Mandé du Sud (Mamadou Kamara)

Researcher: Esther Tisa Francini (Museum Rietberg Zürich), Gesine Krüger (Projektleiterinnen, Universität Zürich), Michaela Oberhofer (Projektleiterinnen, Museum Rietberg Zürich), Nanina Guyer (Museum Rietberg Zürich) and Anja Soldat (Universität Zürich)

Link: https://rietberg.ch/forschung/himmelheber; https://www.hist.uzh.ch/de/fachbereiche/neuzeit/lehrstuehle/krueger/forschung/Projekte/Himmelheber.html

Brief Description: International Inventories Programme (IIP) is an artistic, research and curatorial project that investigates Kenyan objects held in cultural institutions outside of Kenya. The explicit intention and question of International Inventories Programme is, how to make objects which currently reside in a institutions within the global North, present again in contemporary Kenya? Artists and scholars will approach this question through new artworks (such as video, installations, photography) and academic research.

Clearly rooted in Nairobi, IIP radiates outwards towards affiliated object collections in the Global "North". This positioning of the project is explicit and conscious; in order to work through entangled colonial legacies, it is essential to move beyond the emerging institutional awareness of the “North” to engage with discourses and discussions from the "South". If we genuinely believe in ideas of shared heritage and histories, notions such as the "Universal Museum" should also be applicable to museums located outside of the heart of the former colonial empires.

Duration: 2018 – 2021

Funding: Kulturstiftung des Bundes, Goethe-Institut e.V. Excellence Initiative

Cooperation: Goethe-Institut Kenia, National Museums of Kenya, SHIFT Kollektiv (Frankreich/Deutschland), The Nest Collective (Kenia)

Researchers: Goethe-Institut Nairobi: Anisha Soff, Sheila Akwany; National Museums of Kenya: Lydia Nafula, Philemon Nyamanga, Juma Ondeng‘, Njeri Gachihi; Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum: Clara Himmelheber; SHIFT Kollektiv: Sam Hopkins, Marian Nur Goni, Simon Rittmeier; The Nest Collective: Jim Chuchu, Njoki Ngumi; Weltkulturen Museum: Julia Friedel, Frauke Gathof, Leonie Neumann

Link:https://www.inventoriesprogramme.org/

Brief Description: The Africa Accessioned Working Group was initiated by the International Committee of Museums of Ethnography (ICME) in cooperation with the Southern African Development Community Heritage Association (SADCHA) in order to access and inventory collections of Southern African artefacts (Namibia, Botswana, Simbabwe) held in European museums (Germany, Finland, Great Britain). In the sub-working group Namibia Accessioned colleagues from collection and research institutions in German-speaking countries and Namibia share their knowledge on collections and develop collaborative research and exhibition projects. Namiba Accessioned is running a mailing list that is open to interested colleauges.

Duration: since 2014

Cooperation: Namibia, Botswana

Researchers: Jeremy Silvester (ICME and Museums Association of Namibia), Larissa Förster (German Lost Art Foundation), Clara Himmelheber (Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum Köln),  Jonathan Fine (Ethnologisches Museum Berlin)

Brief Description: In Rahmen der gegenwärtig erfolgenden Auseinandersetzung mit der kolonialen Herkunft großer Teile der Sammlungen aus dem heutigen festländischen Tansania im Ethnologischen Museum Berlin soll das Projekt eine nachhaltige Kooperation mit den oben genannten Institutionen etablieren. Dabei werden Fragestellungen postkolonialer Provenienzforschung, die Kollaboration, Multiperspektivität sowie eine Transzendierung der kolonialen Archive voraussetzen, durch die Einbeziehung der noch unzureichend wissenschaftlich bearbeiteten ethnographischen und historischen Sammlungen des National Museum of Tanzania grundlegend erweitert. Die bislang eher vernachlässigte Verknüpfung zwischen den Sammlungen europäischer Museen und jener afrikanischen Länder ist auch insoweit ein Forschungsdesiderat, als das National Museum and House of Culture in Dar es Salaam, wie viele andere afrikanischen Museen, auf koloniale Museumsgründungen zurückgeht. Die Verknüpfung ausgewählter Objekte der Sammlungen aus Berlin mit ausgewählten Beständen des National Museum of Tanzania wird in Form von Workshops in Dar es Salaam und Forschungsreisen zu den Herkunftsorten ausgewählter Objekte realisiert. Dazu gehört auch die Digitalisierung der betreffenden Objekt- und Archivalienbestände des National Museum of Tanzania, die Entwicklung einer Datenbank sowie Publikationen und eine Ausstellung in Dar es Salaam und an anderen Standorten in Tansania.

Duration: Juli 2019 – Juni 2022

Funding: Gerda Henkel Stiftung

Cooperations: History Department der University of Dar es Salaam; National Museum of Tanzania; Nachfahren der Produzent_innen, Nutzer_innen und Vorbesitzer_innen der Objekte

Researcher: Paola Ivanov, Andreas Eckert, Kristin Weber-Sinn, Achiles Bufure und Flower Manase (National Museum and House of Culture, Dar es Salaam), Oswald Masebo (History Department/University of Dar es Salaam), u.a.