(Un)known Creators from the Americas – The Role of Indigenous Authorship in Anthropological Museums
Conference
28. November 2025, 13.00 – 20.00
29. November 2025, 09.30 – 18.00
Organised by Museum der Kulturen Basel and Corpus Americanensium Antiquitatum-Kommission Schweiz
From small earrings to boats and houses, from light feather works to heavy stone blocks: The collections of Anthropological Museums contain an enormous quantity of things that invite us to engage with archives of human creativity. But who are the people who made them? Established practices of collecting and presenting things have often overlooked their creators. Conversely, Indigenous actors carefully and consciously chose what information about authorship to share with collectors, researchers, and museums.
This conference takes a closer look at the narratives about the artists, creators, makers (their lives, biographies and skills) of items of daily use, things of ritual significance, sound, photography, and movies preserved in museums. It also aims to shed light on the Indigenous impact on museum collections and the practice of collecting in general. The conference challenges the knowledge production of Anthropological Museums and provenance research practices.
Presentations will be in English, Spanish and Portuguese
Registration and Information:
jago.steidle@bs.ch and alexander.brust@bs.ch
Inscription Fees: CHF 30.00 (2 days); CHF 20.00 (1 Day); Students, Indigenous community members CHF 0.00.
Supported by the Swiss Academy of Social Sciences and Humanities
Programme:
Friday / Viernes 28.11.2025
13:00-14:00 Registration / Inscripción – Small Lunch and Coffee / Almuerzo pequeño y Café
14:00-14:15
Welcome / Bienvenidos
Alexander Brust (Museum der Kulturen Basel / Corpus Americanensium Antiquitatum-Kommission, Switzerland)
14:15-16:00
Visibilities / Visibilidades
(Un)Known Artists of the Amazon: Between Tradition and Individuality
Claudia Augustat, (Weltmuseum Wien, Austria) Keynote
Tz’iib und uxul: Writing, Image, and their Creators in Maya Culture
Christian Prager, (University Bonn, Germany)
From Anonymity to Authorship: Identifying the Hand of Du’kļwayella (Richard Carpenter) in Northwest Coast Indigenous Art
Monika Zessnik (Ethnologische Museum Berlin, Germany)
16:00-17:00
Exibition Visit / Visita a la exposición
Creators – People and their Works
Alexander Brust, Jago Steidle, Anna Zeller (Museum der Kulturen Basel, Switzerland)
17:00-17:45 Coffee Break / Pausa con café
17:45-19:30
Origins / Orígenes
Dreaming the Belt: Distributed Creativity and Entangled Authorship in Mapuche Weaving
Lucas da Costa Maciel, (University Leiden, The Netherlands)
Raízes: Relational Temporalities, Memory, and Decolonial Artistic Practices
Vandria Borari (Indigenous artist and activist, Brazil) and Carolina Brunelli (Artist, Researcher Brazil / Switzerland)
Creadores espirituales
José Manuel Sauna Mamatacan (Organización Gonawindúa Tayrona, Colombia) y Laura Felicitas Sabel (delasierra, Suiza /Leuphana Universität Lüneburg, Alemania)
20:00 Dinner / Cena
Saturday / Sábado 29.11.2025
09:30-11:00
Actors / Actores
Between the Andes and the Alps: Transatlantic Choreographies of a Fine Carved Gourd
Joaquín Molina (University Bonn, Germany)
El tercer género en la elaboración de la vestimenta de las mujeres de la región del Istmo de Tehuantepec
Natalia Hernanz García (University Bonn, Germany)
Who created the tamoko Mask?
Beatrix Hoffmann-Ihde (University Bonn, Germany)
11:00-11:30 Coffee Break / Pausa con café
11:30-12:30
Dynamics / Dinámicas
Pottery and Mobility in Shawi Territory: Revealing Cultural Dynamics Beyond a Museum Collection in Peruvian Amazonia
Lesly García Soto (University Bonn, Germany) and Jorge Carranza Orbegoso (Amazonia Bicentennial Study Group at PUCP’s Riva-Agüero Institute, Peru)
(Re)cosiendo un quillango. Algunas consideraciones en torno a la autoría, la invisibilidad y las (posibles) reactivaciones de un objeto patagónico del Museo de Etnografía de Neuchâtel
Sara Sánchez del Olmo (IHAR – Universidad de Lausana, Suiza) / Corpus Americanensium Antiquitatum-Kommission Schweiz)
12:30-14:30 Lunch Christmas Market / Almuerzo Mercado Navideño
14:30-16:00
Encounters / Encuentros
Indigenous Iowa at the Court in France
Nikolaus Stolle (Anthropologist, Independent Researcher, Germany)
Un encuentro inesperado con creadores Waorani de la colección Wustmann en el Museo BASA
Naomi Rattunde (University Bonn, Germany)
A Collection of Kaiowá Drawings as Art and Archive
Carl Deußen (Weltkulturen Museum Frankfurt, Germany)
16:00-16:30 Coffee Break / Pausa con café
16:30-17:30
Collectivities / Colectividades
Disentangling Authorship: Andean Weavers' Cultural Rights over Musealised Textiles
Federica Villa (University of Milan-Bicocca, Italy)
Collective Authorship and Material Agency in Amazonian Pottery
Carla Jaimes Betancourt and Lesly Garcia (University Bonn, Germany)
Optional / Opcional
18:00
Visit to Vandria Borari‘s and Carolina Brunell’s Work “Raízes”
Regionale 26, Projektraum 54
20:00 Dinner / Cena