[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/iac_gallery_1718805074285_eng.jpg?w=878″]<\/p>\n
\n\tA total of 111 Indigenous artworks are still missing from the Indigenous Art Centre\u2019s (IAC) collection\u00a0in Canada, almost two years after an internal audit revealed 132 unaccounted artworks, the Canadian Press<\/em> reports.<\/p>\n \n\tIn November 2024, IAC conducted an internal audit of its collection that tracked its operations from April 2019 to August 2024, which revealed that it could not locate 132 objects in its collection. Neither the missing works nor their value have been publicly identified.<\/p>\n \n\tSince then, the Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada (CIRNAC), a federal department under which the IAC falls, has found 17 missing artworks, with an additional four flagged as possible duplicate entries in IAC\u2019s database. The department is reportedly still looking for the missing works in regional federal government buildings.<\/p>\n \n\tThe audit warned of an \u201cincreased risk of theft and security breaches\u201d due to a relocation of the center\u2019s collection to temporary storage facilities in 2022, while its former storage site was being renovated.<\/p>\n \n\tIAC\u2019s collection was started in 1965 by the Government of Canada to support \u201cthe creation, preservation and promotion of contemporary Indigenous art in Canada,\u201d per its website. The center\u2019s holdings include some 5,000 works by First Nations, M\u00e9tis, and Inuit artists\u2014including Norval Morrisseau, Christi Belcourt, Elisapee Ishulutaq, and Kent Monkman\u2014and is valued at an estimated C$14.4 million ($10.4 million).<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cCrown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada understands the importance of its responsibility to the collection and to Canadians. That is why we will continue to appropriately care for these national treasures, improve our art management practices, and strive for excellence,\u201d CIRNAC spokesperson Jacinthe Goulet told Canadian Press<\/em>. She added that the department is working to improve its art management and recordkeeping, and reinforcing security and contracting rules.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cAn \u2018unaccounted for\u2019 designation does not mean an artwork is lost or stolen,\u201d Mary\u00e9va M\u00e9tellus, another CIRNAC spokesperson, told\u00a0the Art Newspaper<\/em>. \u201cRather, it is an inventory and records-management designation assigned to an artwork whose location cannot be confirmed through available documentation. It indicates that further review and reconciliation of records is required before the artwork\u2019s status can be confirmed. There are no criminal investigations underway. Of the remaining 111 artworks still to be accounted for, 20 are reproductions.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tDespite more recent efforts, however, others do not share the same optimism about the return of these unaccounted-for works. \u201cThis is just another example of government incompetence,\u201d Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun, a Cowichan (Hul\u2019q\u2019umi\u2019num Coast Salish) and Okanagan (Syilx) artist whose painting\u00a0Leaving My Reservation to Go to Ottawa and Fight for a New Constitution<\/em>\u00a0(1985) is among the IAC collection, told the Art Newspaper<\/em>. <\/p>\n \n\tYuxweluptun called for the Indigenous Art Centre to be shut down and its collection to be transferred to other institutions who \u201ccan do a better job and be more responsible for native art.\u201d He added, \u201cThis needs to be rectified.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/artworks-still-missing-indigenous-art-centre-canada-1234795609\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/iac_gallery_1718805074285_eng.jpg?w=878″] A total of 111 Indigenous artworks are still missing from the Indigenous Art Centre\u2019s (IAC) collection\u00a0in Canada, almost two years after an internal audit revealed 132 unaccounted artworks, the Canadian Press reports. In November 2024, IAC conducted an internal audit of its collection that tracked its operations from April 2019 to August […]<\/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-2109762","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\/2109762","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=2109762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2109762\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2109762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2109762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2109762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}