A
collection of images taken by the first official photographer of the
royal court of Benin, Solomon Alonge, have found their way back to the
ancient city from Washington D.C., after they were put on exhibition at
the National Museum, Benin City, on Friday...
The
photographs span half a century and capture vital moments across the
reigns of two Benin kings – Oba Akenzua II (1933-1978) and Oba Erediauwa
(1979-2016). They also include vivid representations of ordinary Benin
citizens, who visited Alonge’s Ideal Studio to have their self-portraits
taken.
The
voyage back to Nigeria was made possible by the collaboration between
the National Commission for Museums and Monuments (NCMM) and the
Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, which had acquired the
collection in 2009 from the Alonge family for a “substantial” amount of
money, a senior archivist at the Washington-based museum, Dr. Amy
Staples, told THISDAY.
This
collaboration marks the first time the Smithsonian’s National Museum of
African Art will travel with an exhibition to the African continent.
The Alonge collection had previously been on display at the Washington Museum between September 17, 2014, and July 31, 2016.
“Through
this portrait photography in the Ideal Photo Studio, Alonge provided
local residents – many for the first time – with the opportunity to
represent themselves as dignified African subjects,” Staples, who also
doubled as the collection’s co-curator, said.
“His
portraits of an emerging elite society in Benin City not only
illustrate the cosmopolitan and modernising influences of the 20th
century in Nigeria, they preserve the social history of Benin and its
traditional leaders for future research and educational programmes at
the National Museum of Benin City,” Staples explained.
Alonge’s
collection of historic photographs, which was captured on Kodak
glass-plate negatives, documents more than 50 years of the ritual,
pageantry and regalia of the Obas, their wives and retainers, a press
statement from the Smithsonian noted, adding: “Alonge’s photographs
reveal a unique insider’s view of the Benin royal family and court
ceremonies, including historic visits by Queen Elizabeth (in 1956),
foreign dignitaries, traditional rulers, political leaders and
celebrities.”
“We’ve
had a series of collaborations with museums across the world, but what
makes this different and significant is not just because we received
training support and funds to refurbish the museum, but that it comes
with a gift of materials that had been taken out of Nigeria,” the
Director-General of NCMM, Yusuf Usman, said.
However,
the Kodak glass-plate negatives, from which the photographs being
exhibited at the Benin Museum were printed, still remain in the United
States as properties of the Smithsonian.
Usman
suggested this was not important. “The original still remains in the
United States, but at least we have the replicas and we are going to use
them to tell the story, of not just the royal court of Benin, but also
of Benin in the 20th century.
“This helps us to plan and understand where we have been as a country, where we are and where we are going,” he said.
Staples
also stressed that “if the Alonge collection had stayed here (Benin),
it would have been completely deteriorated at this point. And nobody
would have been able to share in that story. So we (Smithsonian) try to
play that role: preservationists for the world”.
One
of Nigeria’s most important contemporary artists, Victor Ehikhamenor,
told THISDAY the “return” was a welcome development. “It’s beyond
words,” he said. “We have to start from somewhere. And a situation where
archives are maintained so that history can be retained and the future
generations will know what has happened is always welcome. We need more
of these things. But this is a good starting point.”
Conversely, he noted that Nigerian governments do not pay attention to preserving “our history”.
“We don’t have to always wait for outsiders to poke us to do the right thing,” he admonished.
The
collaboration between NCMM and the Smithsonian Museum resulted in the
renovation of the Benin Museum, which had not undergone any major
facelift since it was first built during the military administration of
Samuel Ogbemudia in the late 1960s.
The
renovation was hugely supported by the Benin Committee, a group of
distinguished professionals that includes the current governor of Edo
State, Godwin Obaseki.
Obaseki
became involved in Alonge’s photography sometime in 2009 after
discovering that his mother, Stella Gbinigie, had visited the famous
photographer as a 16-year old to have her portrait taken.
A renowned scholar and professor of Energy Law, Yinka Omorogbe, heads the Benin Committee.
Other
major partners that made the historic collaboration between NCMM and
the Smithsonian Museum possible include the United States Consulate in
Nigeria and Heritage Bank.
After
acquiring the collection in 2009, Staples travelled to Benin in 2012 to
engage with the Benin community and inform appropriate stakeholders on
the Smithsonian’s intention to hold an exhibition of Alonge’s
photography in Washington.
“Our
first thought was that we have to bring this back to Benin so that they
know about their own visual history,” Staples told THISDAY.
“Many
of the photographs are very personal family photos. So at the
Smithsonian, we do not just take collections and keep them under wraps;
we seek out the communities from where the objects come and we go back
to engage them with the exhibits.
“Many
people didn’t know the photographs existed; they didn’t know what their
grandparents looked like. So it’s really important to them personally
to have some of these photos. That’s kind of how we operate: we engage
with communities,” Staples pointed out.
In
July 2015, the Director General of NCMM and the Director Emerita of the
Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, Dr. Johnnetta Cole, signed a
Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
The
MoU required the Smithsonian to gift every aspect of the exhibit
fabrications from its Washington exhibition of Alonge’s photography –
the banners, the framed photographs, the labels, the panels – to the
Benin Museum.
In
2016, four staff from the Benin Museum were sent to Washington for
three weeks training. The trip was funded by the Ford Foundation
Fellowship.
This
July, the Smithsonian flew in an exhibit expert to train every staff of
the Benin Museum on how to handle the exhibits and mount them.
“After a week, we left and by the time we returned, we found out that they had all become pros,” Staples said.
The
landmark collaboration also gave birth to the publication of a book:
Fragile Legacies, which minutely explored Alonge’s lifelong romance with
photography at a time when the art form was still regarded as a luxury.
The book entertained interesting contributions from prominent Nigerian artists such as Tam Fiofori and George Osodi.
No comments: