Introduction

Welcome to the online Conference Global Provenance!

Since the “Global Provenance” call for papers issued in April 2020, coloniality and appropriated heritage have been in the headlines in Switzerland. In June 2020, a motion was submitted by Geneva Socialist deputy Carlo Sommaruga in the Swiss parliament, entitled Adoption of a federal procedure for museums in Switzerland to participate in the restitution of cultural heritage taken during the colonial era. The motion aims to "put in place procedures to enable Swiss museums to participate actively in the movement for the return and repatriation of cultural heritage taken from their States of origin during the colonial era".

The submission of this motion is in line with critical academic work on Swiss history, leading to the development of a colonial history of Switzerland and the decolonisation of the academic and cultural worlds.

This news, like the numerous international proposals from artists, academics and heritage professionals in response to our call for participation, demonstrates the importance of thinking all together about the future of these expatriate heritages. This process of reflection must imperatively be collective at several levels, for example a concerted effort between the natural and human sciences, a close and respectful partnership between heritage institutions in the South and the North.

To open this international conference, we are privileged to welcome Kristen Carpenter, Professor of Law and Cultural Property at the University of Colorado and Member from North America of the United Nations Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (EMRIP). Her keynote interview by Carine Durand, Head Curator at MEG is dedicated to Indigenous cultural rights and the responsibility of museums, and more specifically the repatriation of ceremonial objects and human remains through the prism of the Human Rights defined by the United Nations.

We will then discuss the status and future of colonial collections, the transparent framework in which provenance research is or should be carried out, its objectives and perimeters but also its extensions and interpretations towards contemporary creation. The ethic of relations between museums and source communities will be at the heart of the discussions as well as active or pending repatriation policies.