Current News
| Dear Friends, The late Michael Haney was on airorf’s board of trustees from 1993 – 2005. In addition to his work for the return of ceremonial material home, Michael fought tirelessly and vociferously to put a stop to the use of derogatory names on sports teams. I think of him now and know this is, in part, his victory. Elizabeth Sackler |
 |
| Christie’s To Return Cambodian Statue The New York Times | May 7, 2014 Yet another ancient statue looted in the 1970s from a single remote temple in the jungles of Cambodia has turned up in the United States, this time at Christie’s, which is voluntarily paying to return it to it’s homeland. |
 |
| Selling a Fake Painting Takes More Than a Good Artist The New York Times | May 3, 2014 The recent arrest in Spain of two brothers accused of passing off forged paintings as the work of America’s greatest Modernist masters has refocused attention on the people behind an art fraud that has lasted 15 years, garnered $80 million and helped bring down New York’s oldest gallery, Knoedler & Company. |
 |
| Vision of Hope The New York Times | April 20, 2014 The ruins of the ancient Greek city of Morgantina sit high on a hill in eastern Sicilu. There are cherry trees, wildflowers and total stillness, save for the sound of bird song. |
 |
| Gathering of Gods From Places Long Forgotten The New York Times | April 11, 2014 When the Metropolitan Museum of Art gives its all to an exhibition in terms of space, money and scholarship, and the art involved is as rish as a massed chorale and as haunting as a single-voice chant, no institution on earth can produce more impressive results. |
 |
| Sending Artworks Home but to Whom The New York Times | January 4, 2014 The paleontologist Richard Leakey has called their removal a “sacrilege.” Kenyan villagers have said their theft led to crop failure and ailing live stock… |
 |
| Secrect Bids Guide Hopi Indians’ Spirits Home The New York Times | December 17, 2013 The auction in Paris was set to move briskly, at about two items a minute; the room was hot and crowded, buzzing with reporters… |
 |
| Hopi masks sold at Paris auction amid protests The Japan Times | April 14, 2013 In a chaotic auction repeatedly interrupted by protests, dozens of Native American tribal masks were sold Friday after a French court ignored the objections of the Hopu tribe and the U.S. government. |
 |
| Paris auction house sells Hopi Masks despite tribe’s objection The Guardian | April 12, 2013 A Paris auction house has gone ahead with a contested sale of dozens of Native American tribal masks after winning a court ruling, despite appeals for a delay by the Hopi tribe, its supporters and the US government. |
 |
| Auction of Hopi Masks Proceeds After Judge’s Ruling New York Times | April 12, 2013 A contested auction of sacred Hopi Indian artifacts went forward on Friday in Paris and generated more than$1 million in sale, despite the presense of protesters inside and outside the auction house who urged patrons not to take part. |
 |
| Survival goes to court to stop Hopi sacred objects auction The Survival International | April 10, 2013 Lawyers acting for Survival International have today filed legal papersin an attempt to stop the sale of sacred objects of the Hopi tribe in a Paris auction house this Friday. |
 |
| Paris Judge Orders Hearing on Auction Sale of Hopi Artifacts New York Times | April 9, 2013 A lawyer has convinced a Paris judge to hold a hearing Thursday to determine the legality of a sale of sacred Hopi Indian artifacts by the Neret-Minet auction house that is scheduled for Friday. |
 |
| The Hopi Tribe Opposes Auction of Sacred Objects in France The Hopi Tribe Letter | April 4, 2013 The Hopi Tribe is vehemently opposed to the auction of Hopi sacred objects at the upcoming Neret-Minet Tessier & Sarrou auction scheduled for April 12 in France. The tribe is requesting that the sacred objects be returned to the Hopi Tribe immediately. |
 |
| Hopis Try To Stop Paris Sale of Artifacts New York Times | April 4, 2013 In a rare case of a cultural heritage claim arising from the sale of American artifacts abroad, the Hopi Indians of Arizona have asked federal officials to help stop a high-price auction of 70 sacred masks in Paris next week. |
 |
| Daniel Inouye, Hawaii’s Quiet Voice of Conbscience in Senate, Is Dead at 88 New York Times | Dec 18, 2012 Senator Daniel K. Inouye of Hawaii, who went to Washington at the birth of his state in 1959 dominated public life in the Hawaii Islands for more than 50 years and became a quiet voice of national conscience during the Watergate scandal and the Iran-contra affair died on Monday in Bethesda, Md. |
 |
| Without Reservation New York Times | Nov. 25, 2012 In his 1936 essay “The Storyteller,” Walter Benjamin drew a sharp distinction between prose fiction, meaning novels and short stories, and actual storytelling, meaning spoken narratives passed from one individual to another. |
 |
| On Wounded Knee New York Times | Oct 24, 2012 Russell Mean, the Oglala Lakota Sioux protester, organizer and actor who led the American Indian Movement through an era of vivid, often violent protests in the 1970s, didn’t win much in the way of fundamental political and social change. AIM had too much chaos and infighting for that. |
 |
| Russell Means, Who Clashed With Law As He Fought for Indians, IS Dead at 72 New York Times | Oct 23, 2012 Russell C. Mean, the charismatic Oglala Sioux who helped revive the warrior image of the American Indian in the 1970s with guerrilla-tactic protests that called attentionto the nation’s history of injustices against its indigenous peoples, died on Monday athis ranch in Porcupine, S.D., on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. |
 |
| Dispute Over Bill on Borrowed Art New York Times | May 22, 2012 The lending and borrowing of famous artworks is the essence of cultural exchange between museums in the United States and abroad. So routine is the practice, and so universally valued, that the American government has traditionally protected it with a law that shileds a lent work from being seized by anyone with a claim to legal ownership while the art is on display here. |
 |
| Honoring Art, Honoring Artists February 6, 2011 New scholarship attributes Indian works to individuals, by name, not just to tribes. When the Denver Art Museum’s signature American Indian art galleries reopened last week after a seven-month overhaul, the biggest change wasn’t the new display cases or the dramatic lighting. Rather, it was in a less obvious place: the wall labels. |
 |
| Remembering Jake Swamp October 14, 2010 Jake Swamp‐Tekaronianeken, 69, the Wolf Clan Mohawk diplomat, author, teacher, chief, husband, father, grandparent and greatgrandparent passed into the spirit world on October 14, 2010 at his home on the Akwesasne Mohawk Territory. Swamp was one of the most respected and honoured Mohawk Iroquois leaders of the past century. |
 |
| Process Established for Disposition of Native American Human Remains March 15, 2010 www.nps.gov WASHINGTON –The National Park Service today announced a final rule has been published in the Federal Register establishing a process for the disposition of Native American human remains that are in museums or on exhibit in the United States and which have not yet been culturally affiliated to a tribe or Native Hawaiian organization. |
 |
| Statement by the President on Native American Heritage Day November 25, 2009 “Tomorrow, Americans everywhere will observe our National Day of Thanksgiving. It will be a time of celebration and reflection as we gather with family and friends to count our blessings and remember those less fortunate. But it will also be a time to remember how this holiday began– as a harvest celebration between European settlers and the American Indians who had been living and thriving on the continent for thousands of years.” |
 |
| American Indian Institute: Traditional Circle of Indian Elders and Youth www.twocircles.org On August 12,2009 Joe Medicine Crow, 95, Patriarch of the Crow Nation and one of the founding members of the Traditional Circle of Indian Elders and Youth, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama along with four other distinguished individuals. |
 |
| NARF Bids Farewell to True Modern Day Warrior: Walter Echo-Hawk Jr. www.narf.org It is with great sadness and with well wishes that NARF bids farewell to senior staff attorney Walter “Bunky” Echo-Hawk. Walter retired from NARF at the end of March. |
 |
| Ritual Seldom Seen Off The Reservation by Harriett Skye from the United Tribes News, August 2009, vol. 18 -No.8 Students and staff are accustomed to taking part in traditional ceremonies on the campus of United Tribes Technical College. But one held on July 7 as part of a cultural awareness series was more notable than most. |
 |
| 2 Disputed Indian Wampum Belts Pulled From Auction by James Barron of the NY York Times, May 19, 2009 Sotheby’s has removed two ceremonial Indian wampum belts from an auction scheduled for Wednesday following complaints by the Onondaga nation that the belts we part of their cultural heritage and should be returned. |
 |
