Restitution of Indigenous and colonial-era artifacts, a pressing debate for museums and national collections across Europe, is one of the many agenda items awaiting Pope Francis on his trip to Canada, which begins this weekend.
From left, Gerald Antoine, First Nations NWT Regional Chief, Natan Obed, President of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami delegation, and Cassidy Caron, President of the Metis community, walk in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, after their meeting with Pope Francis, Friday, April 1, 2022.
But Indigenous groups from Canada, who were shown a few items in the collection when they traveled to the Vatican last spring to meet with Francis, question how some of the works were actually acquired and wonder what else may be in storage after decades of not being on public display.“These pieces that belong to us should come home,” said Cassidy Caron, president of the Metis National Council, who headed the Metis delegation that asked Francis to return the items.
“For so long we had to hide who we were. We had to hide our culture and hide our traditions to keep our people safe,” she said. “Right now, in this time when we can publicly be proud to be Metis, we are reclaiming who we are. And these pieces, these historic pieces, they tell stories of who we were.”
During the spring visit, Natan Obed, who headed the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami delegation, raised the issue of an Inuit kayak in the collection that was featured in a 2021 report in The Globe and Mail newspaper. Obed was quoted by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. as saying the museum head, the Rev. Nicola Mapelli, was open to discussing its return.
It is possible Indigenous peoples gave their handiworks to Catholic missionaries for the 1925 expo or that the missionaries bought them. But historians question whether the items could have been offered freely given the power imbalances at play in Catholic missions and the government’s policy of eliminating Indigenous traditions, which Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission has called “cultural genocide.
The Holy See’s Indigenous collection began centuries ago, with some pre-Columbian items sent to Pope Innocent XII in 1692, and has been amplified over the years by gifts to popes, especially on foreign trips. Of the 100,000 items originally sent for the 1925 exhibit, the Vatican says it has kept 40,000.
The catalogue also said the museum welcomes dialogue with Indigenous peoples, and the museum has held up its collaboration with Aboriginal communities in Australia before a 2010 exhibit. The collection’s director, Mapelli, a missionary priest and an associate visited those communities, took video testimonies and traveled the world seeking more information about the museum’s holdings.
This undated photo provided Wednesday, July 20, 2022, by Gregory Scofield, shows a pair of mocassins he made in the late 19th-century Cree-Metif native Canadian traditional style. The Vatican's Anima Mundi Ethnological Museum houses tens of thousands of artifacts and art made by Indigenous peoples from around the world.
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