An hour before a group of men stormed the Museum of West African Art (MOWAA), I stood alone in a quiet room at the site in front of a vibrant mural by the UK-born and New York-based Nigerian artist Tunji Adeniyi-Jones. Figures filled the orange-red painting, their bodies moving elegantly across the piece alongside a leopard with piercing yellow eyes.
At the centre of Benin City – the capital of Edo State in Nigeria – around 15 acres of land have been set aside for a new cultural campus that together will make up the globally anticipated Museum of West African Art. Since its inception in 2020, it has been described as a space set to transform the city into a significant art destination not just in Nigeria, but globally. “I think from the beginning what we’ve wanted to do was to establish an institution that is relevant to young people in the creative sector,” said the museum’s director, Phillip Ihenacho.
But on November 9th, on a quiet Sunday morning, after diplomats, artists, and donors bundled into white vans straight from the airport to the unveiling of its first completed structure, a protest erupted and brought the museum’s immediate plans to an abrupt halt. The 4,500-square-metre ‘Institute’ houses a research, conservation, and collections centre built from packed red earth, and features storage facilities and an exhibition space. It remains temporarily closed.
The confrontation reflects longstanding concerns about the museum’s opening among some residents, as well as tensions between the Royal Palace of the Oba of Benin, the current governor, and the museum. Questions have been raised about land acquisition, the institution’s name (formerly the Edo Museum of West African Art), the involvement of the previous governor, sources of funding, and who ultimately stands to benefit from the independent non-profit.
Over the past five years, around 150 Benin Bronzes – a catch-all phrase used to refer to a large collection of artefacts looted by British forces in 1897 and held by institutions and private collections worldwide – have been reported as returned. Many of these were on show at the National Museum in Benin City as part of Restitution in Motion, a public exhibition of the treasures which ran until November 28th.
In 2020, the Museum of West African Art was widely described as preparing to showcase the most comprehensive display of Benin Bronzes in the world. The museum later expressed that it was moving away from this narrative, focusing attention on modern and contemporary art from the African continent and its diaspora. However, critics still argue that certain events leading up to the present have revealed otherwise, fuelling questions about how the museum positions itself in relation to ongoing restitution debates. Some point to a fundraising document dating back to September 2023, which features an image of the bronze Equestrian Oba and Attendants (1550–1680) under a section titled ‘Artifacts’.
“By mid to late 2021, we made a conscious decision to step away from the restitution conversation and allow those parties who are much more relevant to have that discussion,” Ihenacho explained a day after the protests. He added that “Western press, despite everything that we say, still portrays us as the museum where the Benin bronzes are going.”
Yet beyond the multilayered dispute that has been percolating since its inception and despite the disruption that followed, the city’s artists continue to work; a reminder that Benin’s creative energy runs deeper, older and far wider than any single institution.
Adeniyi-Jones’s site-specific mural forms part of Nigerian Imaginary: Homecoming, an expanded version of an exhibition for the Nigerian Pavilion at the 60th Venice Biennale last year, brought together a group of artists of Nigerian heritage. Curator Aindrea Emelife explained that the artist created his piece during a three-and-a-half-week residency in Benin, assisted by three local artists, which, she added, roots the work firmly in the city’s creative landscape.
“I was working alongside what I would consider to be a significant representative of present-day artists in Benin,” Adeniyi-Jones said, noting that his collaborators were local artists who are working in the city, with many other projects under their belt.
Earlier that afternoon, I had watched the protestors – some armed with wooden bats – from a window inside the museum compound. Signs were ripped down, and some had entered the building. That evening, keen not to hide away in our hotel, I, with three other journalists, ventured over to Nosona Studios, a large creative hub where emerging artists from Edo State are taught and mentored as well as offered studio and exhibition space.
It was founded by Benin City resident and internationally recognised multidisciplinary artist Enotie Ogbebor in 2017. The space came about to “encourage artists to hone their talent and skills, engage with the public and find a way to package their work for their market,” Ogbebor said in an interview two years after its opening, a sentiment he reiterates while guiding us around as a live band plays in the garden where traditional Nigerian street food is being served.
Elsewhere in the city, another world-renowned creative, Victor Ehikhamenor, who grew up nearby, is hosting a party. The visual artist and writer is celebrating the start of his inaugural Black Muse Art Festival, a five-day affair honouring African arts and culture. According to Ehikhamenor and some guests, over 400 people attended the event, which included the unveiling of the Black Muse Sculpture Park, a cultural site currently hosting a temporary exhibition of seven artists, two of whom are showcasing works in bronze.
“One of the artists is actually from the bronze-casting guild,” explained Kenyan curator, Renée Mboya, referring to a hereditary organisation located on the historical Igun Street in Benin City, known as the Guild of Benin Bronze and Brass Casters, or Ìgùn Ẹ́rọ̀nwwọ̀n. “It was interesting for him to consider whether or not he wanted to display Benin bronze in a traditional [manner], though his practice is non-traditional.”
When creating the different fractions of Black Muse, Ehikhamenor noted that he needed to think carefully about its relationship to Benin City. “It's a nation in itself, and they have their own way of doing things. People have to be able to recognise, acknowledge, and respect that,” he said. “While we are fast-forwarding and racing to what we call modernity, how many people have actually slowed down to say, how did [Benin] maintain a kingdom that survived a lot of onslaught culturally?”
Last year, Ehikhamenor also opened Black Muse Residency, an eleven-room artists’ retreat, all an extension of his non-profit Angels and Muse, founded in 2018 to empower the creative talents of Africa. “I call it an artist residency, but it's actually more of a creative residency for journalists, sculptors, architects, researchers – any sector that has to do with something creative is more than welcome,” he added.
Considering more traditional practices associated with Benin City, two days after the Museum of West African Art dispute, local sculptor Monday Aigbe introduced me to his family guild on Igun Street, pointing out that the incident was more than just a headline to him. He was eagerly anticipating the influx of visitors attending the museum opening to stop by his quarter, but he imagines many were shaken by it.
“I am a famous bronze caster known all over the world, so I was expecting them, but very few came,” he said, noting that he has been making bronze sculptures for over 40 years and has even been considering how to build a more modern system of casting to continue his family lineage. “My father was a bronze caster, my grandfather was a bronze caster, my own great-grandfather was one of the people who moulded some of the Bronzes that were [looted].”
Ultimately, as you walk around Benin City, you can see remnants of what Museum of West African Art was attempting to achieve: from the National Museum, Igun Street, the local artists, and even a building made of red earth, formerly inhabited by a local chief, an echo of the museum’s own architectural design.
But roaming the streets also highlights a much wider and possibly more important fact, which is that, artistically, the city has a lot more to offer than a single building. “We are hoping by next year everything with the museum will be sorted and more people will come to Benin City,” Aigbe added. “Maybe then I will organise my own exhibition at my house and show the world that there are still bronzes [being made here].”
