[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Foto-9.jpeg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tThe Australian Museum has returned 18 ancestral remains to the people of Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island). The news was reported by the Art Newspaper<\/em> following a July 27 announcement by Chile\u2019s National Cultural Heritage Service.<\/p>\n \n\tThe repatriated human remains (known locally as Ivi Tupuna) include 17 skulls and one sample of hair, which have been in the museum\u2019s collection since the late 19th century. They were among a number of objects and remains removed from Rapa Nui by an 1882 German naval expedition and were acquired by the Australian Museum in 1883.<\/p>\n \n\tThe remains were returned in a ceremony at Arturo Merino Benitez International Airport in Santiago, Chile, after which they were flown to Rapa Nui. The Chilean undersecretary of cultural heritage, Emilio De la Cerda, along with representatives from the Rapa Nui Council of Elders, the Easter Island Development Commission (CODEIPA), the Australian Embassy in Chile, and the Australian Museum, attended.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cThe return of our Ivi Tupuna allows our ancestors to return to the place where they always belonged, strengthening our memory, our spirituality, and the bond with our future generations,\u201d said Carlos Edmuns Paoa, president of the Rapa Nui Council of Elders. \u201cWe are grateful for the commitment of the Australian Museum and all the institutions that made this restitution process possible, which represents a new step in repairing a history marked by dispossession.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tAfter the remains\u2019 arrival at Rapa Nui, the community welcomed them in a traditional ceremony. Protocols defined by the people of Rapa Nui will dictate their future care and protection. \u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe restitution is part of a continuing effort by the Rapa Nui community to recover items taken from the island during the 19th and 20th centuries and that today remain in collections of museums and institutions around the world. The British Museum, for instance, has long faced calls from the Rapa Nui people to return two moais,<\/em> or carved stone figures of ancestor spirits, removed from the island by the crew of the British ship HMS Topaze<\/em> in 1868.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/australian-museum-returns-rapa-nui-ancestral-remains-easter-island-1234794357\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Foto-9.jpeg?w=1024″] The Australian Museum has returned 18 ancestral remains to the people of Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island). The news was reported by the Art Newspaper following a July 27 announcement by Chile\u2019s National Cultural Heritage Service. The repatriated human remains (known locally as Ivi Tupuna) include 17 skulls and one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-2079651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2079651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2079651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2079651\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2079651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2079651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2079651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}