Alpine Museum in Bern returns statue of a saint to Baltschieder, Valais
Keystone-SDA
On Monday the ALPS Alpine Museum of Switzerland returned a late-Gothic statue of a saint to the municipality of Baltschieder in canton Valais after more than 100 years.
The statue was collected from a warehouse in Zollikofen, Bern, on Monday morning and transported by helicopter to the Upper Valais.
The return of the sacred statue will then be celebrated with an official reception at the Baltschieder community centre. In the afternoon, the 15th- or 16th-century statue will be flown to its original location, a chapel in the Baltschieder Valley. There, it will once again be open to the public.
Following the reconstruction of this chapel, the statue had been added to the museum’s collection through the mountaineer and co-founder of the Alpine Museum, Paul Montandon. The ALPS has now complied with the municipality’s request for its return.
The museum describes the return as an example of the changing approach to cultural artefacts from the Alpine regions. While numerous objects used to end up in museums in urban centres, greater consideration is now given to their regional origins.
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Translated from German, reviewed by an English Department journalist.
