What’s Happening: Western museums are mobilizing to return looted artifacts to Benin, but a last-minute power grab by Benin’s oba—a wealthy ceremonial king with slave-trading ancestors—has sparked debate about who benefits from repatriation.

The Download: Restitution of the Benin Bronzes—thousands of bronze figurines, plaques, and altars looted from Nigeria by British troops in 1897—was never going to be easy. Most of the bronzes made their way into Western museums over the past century, a potent reminder of colonialism for Nigerians, who have long called for their return. Plans to repatriate the artifacts have moved ahead as institutions faced a reckoning about aggressive acquisition tactics. The German government, the Smithsonian, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art all agreed to transfer ownership of looted bronzes to Nigeria in recent years. Plans called for the artifacts to be displayed in Benin City’s upcoming Edo Museum of West African Art, a glittering institution designed by David Adjaye slated to open in 2025.

Though the returned treasures reportedly sparked an “artistic awakening” in Benin, disputes surrounding their ownership abound. Would they fall in the hands of Nigeria, its National Commission of Museums and Monuments (NCMM), or Ewuare II, Benin’s oba? Restitution plans snagged when Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria’s outgoing president, transferred ownership of the looted items to the oba, announcing that any returned artifacts “may be kept within the palace of the oba” or in any location he considers secure. He stipulates that no Benin Bronze can be moved without the oba’s written authority and he must inspect and authenticate each one upon its return.

A representative of the royal family said the oba wants to display the works publicly, but the prospect of private ownership sparked anxiety among Western museums and the NCMM negotiating their return given the oba’s astronomical wealth and the bronzes’ collective value of $130 billion. The New York nonprofit Restitution Study Group (RSG) alleges the bronzes were commissioned by the oba’s slave-trading ancestors, who sealed the fate of their own people. They plan to sue the Smithsonian and are stalling efforts at the Met. “These are slave-trade relics being returned to the heirs of the slave trade,” Deadria Farmer-Paellmann, director of the RSG, told the New York Post. “They are rewarding slavery twice.”

According to Phillip Ihenacho, the Edo Museum’s director, repatriation isn’t so cut-and-dry—and should be left in the hands of Africans without Western scrutiny. “It seems fine for the West to take more than 100 years to begin to act on restitution, but unforgivable that Nigeria does not resolve complex domestic and historical issues instantaneously,” he wrote in The Art Newspaper. Britain’s pillage of Benin City, he argues, accelerated the disruption of manufacturing systems for arts and culture; rebuilding this infrastructure is the museum’s main priority. “There should be debate and disagreement about what is the most appropriate outcome [for the bronzes]. This is only natural and will take time to fully resolve.”

In Their Own Words: “We were blindsided,” an NCMM official told the BBC. “This is not practical nor compatible with existing Nigerian law [and] it was written by someone who doesn’t understand how museums work.”

Surface Says: We don’t fault any repatriation efforts, but this situation illustrates how there’s usually a thorny, more complicated side to just about everything that deserves a closer look.

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Perched on a hilltop overlooking Elia Beach, the new 41-room Yi Hotel feels a world away from Mykonos’ party scene. Done up in a soothing mix of wood, straw, and terracotta, the sculptural interiors reflect the forms and colors of the nature that resides outside (blue glass referencing the sea, pistachio doors and windows inspired by olive trees). Guests will discover small treasures throughout, including works from Egyptian artists like a collection of canoes depicting different stories of village life.

While the art touches on the historical relationship between Egypt and Greece, the culinary program is decidedly homegrown. At Sibà, dishes like tomato salad with hand-picked baby tomatoes are powered by local farms, as are cucumber popsicles, mizithra cheese tarts, and the Saint Galini Kakavia, a traditional grouper filet dish from Crete. The menu is the vision of chef George Stylianoudakis, who trained under Alain Ducasse and is a master of Cycladic and Cretan techniques. If the legendary Mykonos nightlife is calling, an on-demand 24-hour concierge will ensure the trip has plenty of bacchanalia.

For a crowd of well-heeled New Yorkers, summer’s unofficial start falls a week after Memorial Day weekend. That’s when the Veuve Clicquot Polo Classic draws a crowd, decked out in linen pantsuits and resort collections, to Liberty Island for the champagne-soaked sporting event. A lucky few from the tony crowd took in the sights from the match’s La Grande Dame cabana pavilion, designed by Stephanie Goto and adorned with Paola Paronetto ceramics.

Earlier this year, the maison teamed up with Paronetto on a colorful array of collectors’ boxes and sculptural champagne magnums to commemorate the 2015 La Grande Dame vintage—so named for Madame Clicquot, the original grande dame. The pavilion’s Veuve-yellow facade gave way to an interior bursting with Paronetto’s kaleidoscopic hues: oceanic blues, seafoam greens, and lilac. “I use color very selectively in my work; it’s very intentional,” Goto says. “I took [those colors] as an inspiration.”

Staggering views of the Manhattan skyline also served as something of a revelation to Goto, who nodded to the city’s shadow with a mural of silhouetted champagne bottles installed along the structure’s backbone. “The ‘backbone’ is a word used to describe the structural quality of the wine. I wanted to embrace some of those characteristics of the wine in the architecture,” she says. “The ethos of champagne is so aligned to architecture in terms of how you conceive it, the creative process of using materials to create something super unique every single year, and using that materiality and pushing to different dimensions.”

The formerly incarcerated artist invests a new series of house-shaped canvases with emblems of his Detroit working-class upbringing as a meditation on how societies are politically administered.

Here, we ask an artist to frame the essential details behind one of their latest works.

Bio: Grant Czuj, 35, New Haven.

Title of work: Home:8447 (2023).

Where to see it: Nina Johnson Gallery, Miami, until July 29.

Three words to describe it: Color, form, materiality.

What was on your mind at the time: I was thinking of those being paid by the hour to obtain and maintain a home. Thinking of those that are locked-up long enough to start referring to the property in their cells and lockers as things that are “back at the house.” Thinking of the colorful quilts at my grandmother’s and the colorful flower gardens my mother loves to grow.

Greta Gerwig’s long-anticipated Barbie movie may be slated for release on July 21, but its grip on the culture has held firm for a while now. Take Valentino’s fuschia and magenta–tinged Spring/Summer 2022 collection, which was instantly dubbed “Barbiecore” by the fashion glitterati when it debuted this past spring. Since then, pink has remained a key piece of the fashion lexicon.

Cultus Artem features three collections: fragrance, skincare, and one-of-a-kind fine jewelry, all of which are made by hand in the company’s San Antonio atelier. Across its divisions, Cultus Artem explores traditional, labor-intensive techniques using precious materials rarely used in the beauty and jewelry spheres.

Surface Says: From premium packaging to the bespoke formulations within, a deep appreciation for beautifying rituals underscores Cultus Artem’s approach to skincare and fragrance. Their fine jewelry makes a fitting last step in any routine.

The story of a catatonic woman awoken after 20 years may change psychiatry.

Meet the clever librarians who foresaw our world of distributed knowledge.

Architecture-branded merch devalues the profession, writes Ryan Scavnicky.

Instacart is giving away limited-edition perfume that smells like “cash back.”