Page 31 - ARUBA TODAY

A31
PEOPLE & ARTS Thursday 17 May 2018
German museum returns looted art to indigenous Alaskans

By DAVID RISING facts.”
Associated Press Prussian Cultural Heritage
BERLIN (AP) — A Berlin mu- Foundation President Her-
seum has returned ancient mann Parzinger carefully
wooden masks, an idol and handed one of the masks
other spiritually significant to Johnson at a ceremo-
artifacts plundered from ny Wednesday, saying he
graves by an explorer to in- hoped they could work to-
digenous Alaskans, ending gether on future historical
an odyssey in which many and cultural projects.
of the items were thought Work is underway on an ex-
forever lost. hibition on Jacobsen, who
The masks, carved from brought thousands of items
spruce or hemlock, are to Germany from settle-
daubed with red pigment ments on the northwest
— a traditional tincture coast of Canada and Alas-
made of seal oil, human ka. It will offer what Parzing-
blood and powder from er said will be a “critical ex-
a stone that indicate they Historical items, plundered from the graves of indigenous Alaskans, displayed during a ceremony amination of the history of
were used in burial cer- at the Ethnological Museum in Berlin on Wednesday, May 16, 2018. the collection from today’s
emonies by tribes in the Associated Press perspective.”
Chugach area of Alaska. between the dead and the in the 1970s. Jacobsen were deter- The self-proclaimed cap-
One mask comes to a living, the future and the Berlin’s Ethnological Mu- mined to have been fairly tain’s accounts are more
sharp point at the top, sym- past,” he said Wednesday. seum only learned in the obtained through pur- adventure than anthropo-
bolizing the deceased’s “If you look, one eye open, 1980s that they had sur- chase or trade. logical, Parzinger said.
transition to the spirit world. one eye shut, it’s like travel- vived and eventually se- Elsewhere, Denmark has “Johan Adrian Jacobsen
Another shows a face with ing between two worlds.” cured their return. already returned human was no academic, he was
one eye open and the oth- The nine artifacts were Johnson learned of their remains that were taken a sailor,” he said.
er closed. Their exact age among some 200 Chugach existence from Jacobsen’s from the Chugach area. Ideally the artifacts re-
hasn’t been determined, items collected for Ger- journals, where the explorer Johnson said much work turned Wednesday would
but they’re thought to be many’s Royal Museum of detailed how he had found remains researching the go back into the caves
up to 1,000 years old. They Ethnology by Norwegian them in caves and taken provenance of other arti- from which they were tak-
were taken from graves in adventurer Johan Adrian them. He traced them to facts scattered in museums en, Johnson said, but since
caves on Chenega Island Jacobsen between 1882 the Ethnological Museum. around the U.S. and the that’s impossible to do with-
in Alaska’s Prince William and 1884. He led a delegation to Ber- world, including Britain, Rus- out risking their destruction,
Sound and a place known Several were thought lost lin in 2015 and has been sia and Finland. the hope is that they will be
as Sanradna, whose exact at the end of World War working since then with the “Sometimes museums feel put on public display in a
location is no longer known, II after being looted from museum and the Prussian that this is the end, that regional museum.
said John Johnson, a repre- the museum by Soviet Red Cultural Heritage Founda- it’s a sad day, but this is re- “They say a picture’s worth
sentative of the Chugach Army troops, but they resur- tion, which oversees Berlin’s ally a new beginning,” he 1,000 words, but when you
Alaska Corporation. The faced in St. Petersburg, Rus- museums, to establish their said. “The more you work have the object it could
group today represents the sia. They were then given provenance and organize together, the more you be a million,” he said. “You
region’s indigenous peo- to a museum in Leipzig in restitution. understand and enjoy the learn so much when you
ple. “They’re a connection communist East Germany Other items collected by significance of these arti- see them up close.”q

Painting newly attributed to Rembrandt on show in Amsterdam

By MIKE CORDER doormat in 2016. studied the painting in de-
Associated Press “It’s that sort of blink- tail.
AMSTERDAM (AP) — A of-an-eye feeling that I “There’s one fantastic flap
painting newly attributed thought ‘this is better than of lace and there’s one
to Dutch Golden Age mas- what they think,’” he said curved edge and it’s so
ter Rembrandt van Rijn Wednesday. fantastic — it’s such a de-
went on display Wednes- Six jumped on a plane to piction of space — that
day in an Amsterdam mu- London to look at the paint- you really want to put your
seum. ing, compared it with an- finger on it,” Six said. “And
The Hermitage Amsterdam other Rembrandt portrait the ability to get there to
museum called it the first hanging in the city’s Na- that end result, in my view
unknown Rembrandt to tional Gallery and bought and in many other experts’
surface in 44 years. it for what now looks like views, only Rembrandt ever
The unsigned, undated a modest 140,000 pounds reached that level.”
17th-century portrait of a ($189,000). After buying the work, he
young man resplendent in Six knows a thing or two brought it home and then
a black cape and white about Rembrandt — one spent months analyzing it Jan Six poses with a painting attributed to famous Dutch Master
lace ruff, at the time attrib- of his wealthy ancestors and consulting with a doz- Rembrandt after it was put on display at the Hermitage museum
uted to an unknown mem- was painted by the master en experts who have now in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Wednesday, May 16, 2018.
ber of Rembrandt’s circle, in the 17th century — so he agreed with his view that Associated Press
caught the eye of Am- knew what to look for in the it is a previously unknown brandt expert Ernst van de the Dutch master, saying
sterdam art dealer Jan Six painting. In this case, a tiny work by Rembrandt. Wetering adds his voice to that not only is it a Rem-
when an auction catalog part of the young man’s Writing in a book about the curators and historians who brandt, but it is a “very high
plopped onto his gallery’s ruff caught his eye as he discovery, renowned Rem- attribute to the painting to quality” work.q