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I first heard about Dr. Barbara Plankensteiner in glowing terms
from Mr. Daniel Inneh; a former Secretary to the Omo N’Oba N’Edo Ukuakpolokpolo
Oba Erediauwa of Benin, and a direct descendant of Chief Inneh, hereditary head
of the Bronze Casters Guild of the Benin Kingdom, based in Igun Street, Benin
City.

We were both working together towards facilitating an
I.W.C-B.B.C film project on ‘The Lost Kingdoms of Africa’; a segment of which
was an interview with Oba Erediauwa on the status of the looted Benin bronzes
and artworks, now in the British Museum and, a documentation of present-day
bronze casting in Benin.

Inneh’s references to Dr. Plankensteiner were centred on the
magnificently-produced and informative 540-page catalogue for the equally grand
touring exhibition, ‘Benin Kings and Rituals: Court Arts from Nigeria’ she had
curated. I met her in December 2009, in Lagos, when she visited my 1979
photography Exhibition and, characteristically, she showed an interest in my
photographs of Oba Erediauwa’s coronation ceremonies and activities. It was no
surprise that Plankensteiner was present at the opening ceremony of Peju
Layiwola’s ‘1897.Com’ exhibition, which revisits the cultural trauma and
consequences of the Benin bronzes and artworks stolen in the guise of war booty
by the British.

A mammoth exhibition

Why and how did she get to curate the mammoth Benin exhibition?

“Since I am the curator of the Sub-Saharan African Collections
and, our museum also owns a big Benin collection; my Director General asked me
to do the exhibition on a large scale with the introduction of Benin
collections from other museums in the United States of America, Britain,
Germany, and the Nigerian National Museum. I got permission from Oba Erediauwa
himself who wrote an introductory note to the catalogue, and worked with the
then D.G. of the National Commission for Museums, Dr. Eluyemi Omotosho.

“It took over four years to prepare the exhibition and I came to
Nigeria four times. There were about 300 works in the exhibition; bronze, ivory
and wood artworks, coral beads, textiles as well as historic and contemporary
photographs, and videos about bronze casting and festivals in the Oba’s palace,
so that people could better understand the art on display.”

Naturally, Plankensteiner is happy about the huge success of the
travelling exhibition, which was first staged in May 2007 at the Museum for
Volkerkunde, Vienna, Austria and ended at the Art Institute of Chicago, US in
September 2008.

“It was very popular and people were very much impressed about
the quality and history of the art; particularly about the history of Nigeria
and the Benin Kingdom since the 16th Century,” she enthused. “It was new to
them,” she continued. “People didn’t know that there are still Kings and nobles
and festivals and, a living culture in Benin. The exhibition gave a larger
picture of the whole culture.”

A thorny issue

I had to seek Plankensteiner’s view on the thorny and recurring
questions of why these great Benin works of art are still in national and
private museums in Britain, Europe and America; their current legal status, and
the possibility of their return to the Benin Kingdom, the original owners.

In his introductory note, Oba Erediauwa had explained that,
“bronzes were records of events in the absence of photography,” and made
viewers aware that they, “will be reading as it were the pages torn off from
the book of a people’s life history; you will be viewing objects of our
spirituality.” Barbara Plankensteiner was both diplomatic and knowledgeable in
her answers. “I am not in a position to represent an institution, but I think
the museums of the world are well aware of crimes committed in the past,” she
points out.

“We are trying to open a
dialogue towards solving the problem. It was the first time a European museum
went to Benin City and [created] awareness on this issue. It was an initiative
and it will take and, must be, a collaborative effort to find a way to put
things right. It is a long time and as the laws now have no legal basis, since
it happened too long ago; the laws are outdated. Now, it is a moral issue. It
is not an easy question and all the parties involved have to work on it.
Whether there is restitution or not, we don’t know. We have to exchange
knowledge and support ourselves and things will work out well. We should not
forget that in Nigeria, there are great collections of Benin art in the Lagos
and Benin City museums and, some of the highlights of our ‘world’ exhibition
came from Nigeria. Oba Erediauwa sent four representatives including his
brother, Prince Edun Akenzua.”

The history of lace

Dr. Plakensteiner is currently in Nigeria working towards a huge
exhibition slated for October 2010 in her museum in Vienna, Austria. As is with
her style to achieve excellence, she has been meticulously working on this
exhibition since 2008, involving many visits to Nigeria. The exhibition is on
LACE; technically, industrial embroidery for which Austria is famous.

“The exhibition,” she explains, “is a cooperative project
between our museum in Austria and the National Museum in Lagos. It is about the
history of the use of lace in Nigeria and the history of the trade in lace from
Austria. It began in Austria when they started to produce a particular type of
lace inspired by tastes from Nigeria in the 1960s.”

There is also an exploratory angle to the exhibition, which she
highlights. “The Swiss always sold lace, but Austria developed a kind of lace
with Nigerian importers. In the beginning, lace came through Lebanese trading
houses. With independence, Austrian manufacturers came to Nigeria and started
dealing directly with Nigerian merchants. So we will be looking at how it
started, how it was introduced, and how the styles developed in the 70s. The
development of embroidery started in Austria. We are trying to get all the
perspectives and document how lace was used in the past. It is established that
the centre of the lace trade was the Lagos-Ibadan axis from where it spread to
other parts of Nigeria. The main users of lace are the Yoruba.”

The Lace Exhibition starts in Vienna in October 2010, at the
Ethnographic Museum and it will be shown at the National Museum in Lagos in
March 2011. There will be an accompanying catalogue with photographs and
informed articles on the different topics represented in the exhibition.

Four Nigerian designers will be chosen to design styles from
lace materials provided by Austrian manufacturers. For now, the final designs
will be displayed on mannequins; and the designs will also be published in the
exhibition catalogue.

Again, Barbara Plakensteiner is trying her tested hand in curating Nigerian
culture for global exposure.