BU’s Stith aids in recovery of historic African artifacts

David Cogger

Nine vigango totems were returned to the government of Kenya last Monday at the United Nations in New York City, due in part to the efforts of Charles R. Stith, director of the African Presidential Archives and Research Center (APARC) at Boston University and former U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Tanzania.

The totems are ceremonial wooden statues between four and six feet tall depicting human faces. The Mijikenda people of Kenya place the statues at gravesites and consider them sacred. Frequent targets for looters, hundreds have been stolen, and many reside in private collections throughout the United States and Europe.

Connecticut art dealer Kelly Gingras discovered the statues during an estate sale for the late screenwriter Jay Preston Allen. Allen purchased the statues in the 1960s when he lived in Kenya with his wife.

Gingras asked Stith if he would contact the Kenyan Embassy in order to facilitate the return of the statues.

“Ambassador Stith and APARC were absolutely essential in making the handover possible,” Gingras said. “Through APARC’s efforts and Ambassador Stith’s work with Kenyan Ambassador Peter N.R.O. Ogego, this will be the first time a gallery, collector, or private dealer has ever willingly returned vigango to Kenya.”
Gingras said she hopes this will become the norm for private collectors throughout the world.

Stith said that the theft of African art has been a big problem for years.

“In some instances, looting of African art has been so widespread that some types of traditional, culturally significant objects are difficult to find on the continent,” Stith said. “Like many former colonized African nations, the government of Kenya is fighting back and trying to reclaim its patrimony.”

Stith praised both Gingras and Brooke Allen, whose family owned the statues, for doing the right thing.

“The return of these vigango totems reaffirms our faith in the human capacity to do what is right and good,” Stith said.