European museum stops displaying human remains

The Pitt Rivers Museum will showcase installations that raise awareness of the pillage of cultural artefacts in colonial times. — AFP Relaxnews

A wind of change is blowing in the world of European museums. At a time when numerous African countries are calling for the restitution of works of art that were collected or pillaged in colonial times, the British Pitt Rivers Museum has announced that it will no longer exhibit shrunken heads and other human remains included in its collection of 500,000 anthropological artefacts.

Museum director Laura Van Broekhoven has warned visitors that they will no longer be able to see certain cultural and ritual artefacts that have been exhibited in Britain since colonial times when the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford reopens to the general public on Sept 22.