An Artful Life: Ekpo Eyo Remembered

Ekpo Okpo Eyo, esteemed archaeologist, art historian, museologist, professor, and beloved colleague, joined the ancestors May 28, 2011. He was eighty years old. His career had a tremendous impact upon African studies and the museum world. Eyo was born in Creek Town, near Calabar, in today’s Cross River State of Nigeria. As a youth in colonial Nigeria he came to admire Kenneth Murray for his unusual work documenting local art traditions. Eyo later attended college at Cambridge University, where he earned the BA and MA in Archaeology and Anthropology in the mid-1960s. He then transferred to the University of Ibadan for the PhD, and completed his dissertation, “Recent Excavations in Ife and Owo and their Implications for Ife and Benin Studies,” in 1974 under the direction of Th urstan Shaw and Alan Ryder. While undertaking his graduate studies, Eyo was also building an enviable professional career as a museologist. Beginning in 1963 as an archaeologist/ethnographer for the Nigerian Federal Department of Antiquities, he was soon promoted to deputy director in 1965. And just three years later, he became director. During this time he also won the admiration of many students as a lecturer at Lagos University. In 1979, he continued as director general of the newly formed Nigerian National Commission for Museums and Monuments. He held this post until 1986 when, fed up with the corruption rampant in Nigeria’s government, he moved to the United States, where he signed on as full professor in the Department of Art History and Archaeology at the University of Maryland. Eyo would later earn American citizenship while maintaining residences in both countries. “Prof ”—as he was commonly known in Nigeria—retired from teaching in 2005. He was known for his anthropologist’s perspective; he wanted his students fi rst and foremost to understand the local contexts of cultural production in Africa, and he invested much time and eff ort to organizing and accommodating the needs of his graduate students engaged in fi eldwork in Nigeria. His generosity in this regard was unforgettable. During his tenure as DG, Eyo was involved in some of the most signifi cant developments in international museum policy of the modern era. He was a member of the UNESCO Expert Committees draft ing the Convention on Th e Illicit Transfer of Cultural Property (1970) and Th e Restitution of Cultural Property Illicitly Appropriated during Colonial Times and their Return to their Countries of Origin (1974). He was vice president of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee from 1976–80 and president of UNESCO’s Organization for Museums, Monuments, and Sites in Africa (1976–78) and the West African Archaeological Association (1976–80). Eyo was integral to the rebuilding or construction of twelve national museums in Nigeria, including those of Benin City; Oron; Owo; Kaduna; Kano; the Old Residency, Calabar; the War Museum, Umuahia; and the Museum of Colonial History, Aba. Eyo strongly believed that for Nigeria to survive as a nation following the civil war, a sense of Nigerian national identity must be cultivated and tribalism eschewed. Th e exhibitions he installed in museums throughout Nigeria refl ect this ethos. Th is is also the reason he put off investigating the archaeology of his own hometown until aft er his retirement from Nigerian federal service—he wanted to avoid accusations of favoritism. As DG, Eyo wrote the guides for fi ve museums, among many other publications, during a time of prodigious scholarly output. Th is, combined with his curatorial, administrative, and research work as DG, set a new standard for what could be accomplished in Nigerian museums. As a scholar, Eyo wrote passionately about African cultures and the importance of protecting their archaeological and artistic legacies. His most important books, Two Th ousand Years of Nigerian Art (1977) and the exhibition catalogue coauthored with Frank Willett, Treasures of Ancient Nigeria (1980), brought Nigeria’s rich artistic heritage to the attention of the world. “Treasures” traveled internationally for several years, to glowing reviews. Th e two volumes became so infl uential that they remain standard works to this day. In 2008, he published From Shrines to Showcases: Masterpieces of Nigerian Art, which continued this life-long in memoriam