U.S. foundation buys Hopi masks at auction to return to tribe

[icymist]

(Reuters) - An American foundation bought nearly two dozen Native American artefacts and will return them to the Hopi tribe in Arizona, which had mounted legal challenges to their planned sale by a French auction house.

The Annenberg Foundation said on Wednesday it had paid $530,000 for the 24 artefacts sold by Eve Auctioneers in Paris on Monday. Twenty-one will be returned to the Hopi Nation and three to the San Carlos Apache, the Los Angeles-based charitable foundation said in a statement.

"These are not trophies to have on one's mantel; they are truly sacred works for the Native Americans," said the foundation's director, Gregory Annenberg Weingarten. "They do not belong in auction houses or private collections."

http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/12/11/us-france-auction-idINBRE9B80QJ20131211