From the Collection

How Did This Get Here? How did this get here? These past exhibitions interrogate institutional histories and reconsider conceptions of value. Lost in the Museum Inherent Vice Inherent Vice: Hidden Narratives  

Gina Borromeo and Jan Howard at Brown's Center for Public Humanities

Benin Head of an Oba How did this get here? RISD Museum curators Jan Howard and Gina Borromeo share the RISD Museum’s process for deaccessioning a bronze head of an oba from Benin prior to its return to Nigeria

Reading List

How Did This Get Here? How did this get here? These resources provide additional context for dialogue and conversation around the case studies featured in this section and other ongoing work at the museum. Unsettling History Acquisitions + Reuniting Histories | RISD Weekend 2020

The Head in Focus

Benin Art and Visual History Ugochukwu-Smooth C. Nzewi How did this get here? The discovery of these treasures resembles that of a valuable manuscript. They are a new “Codex Africanus,” not written on fragile papyrus, but in ivory and imperishable brass.