For Immediate Release Contact: Greg Borzo (312) 665-7100 (For Media Use Only) gborzo@fieldmuseum.org Trip Home The Field Museum has been collaborating closely with the Haida on this repatriation. The Museum provided financial assistance toward the repatriation and obtained corporate donations of some of the necessary supplies. The Haida have been working hard to prepare for the repatriation. Haida artisans have been building traditional bentwood boxes (image available) to carry the remains home and for reburial. Other Haida have been painting the boxes with crest designs and making traditional button blankets to wrap the remains. Still others have been holding seafood dinners and luncheons and other fund-raising events, including auctions, raffles and fashion shows, to raise the money necessary for the work, materials and roundtrip to Chicago’s Field Museum. “We have been scrambling to get everything done with very limited resources, but it will all be worth it because we feel such a strong connection with our ancestors,” Bell said. To celebrate this event, the Haida Repatriation Dance Group will perform a series of songs and dances at The Field Museum in full ceremonial regalia, including traditional blankets and masks. They will talk about their culture and interpret the songs and dances for the audience. More than two dozen singers and dancers will introduce Haida clans, and the performance will feature a butterfly dance, using the butterfly to symbolize homecoming. The Performance by the Haida Repatriation Dance Group will begin at 10:00 a.m. in Stanley Field Hall. At 11:30 a.m., representatives from the Haida and The Field Museum will conduct the Repatriation Ceremony in the Founders Room, at which time the Haida remains will be officially turned over. A press conference, also in the Founders Room, will immediately follow the ceremony. Repatriation of any items from the collections at The Field Museum is a complex issue, points out Robert D. Martin, PhD, Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs at The Field Museum. “It requires a judicious balance between the Museum’s deep respect for other cultures and its trustees’ fiduciary duty to maintain the collections for posterity. “We are particularly sensitive to requests for repatriation when the items concerned are considered to be sacred by the population from which they originated, or when human remains are involved,” Dr. Martin added. The present case is of particular note because the request for repatriation was made by the Haida Gwaii, which lies outside the United States and the federal mandates of the Native Americans Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) governing repatriation. This return is possible because the Museum’s own repatriation policy requires it to consider all requests for American remains equally. “After carefully considering all the facts and circumstances particular to this case,” Dr. Martin said, “the Museum decided to return the remains to a Native American population that historically has spanned the border between the United States and Canada.” Image available: Christian White, Haida master carver, works on a traditional bentwood box for transporting and burying Haida ancestors, while assistant Alan Weir and Lucille Bell, heritage officer of the Haida Repatriation Committee, look on. Photo by Vincent Collison; Courtesy of the Haida Repatriation Committee.