Macron launches new calls for the return of looted African artifacts

A report commissioned by French President Emmanuel Macron recommends that France return to Africa works of art and artifacts preserved in French cultural institutions. He characterizes the collections as part of a "system of appropriation and alienation" that deprives Africans of their "spiritual food, the foundation of their humanity". The authors of the report are Felwine Sarr, Senegalese economist, and Benedicte Savoy. a French historian. As part of its "reinitialization" of relations between France and Africa, President Macron said in 2017 that he wanted to start restoring African cultural artefacts in the next five years. However, under French law, the French government is prohibited from restoring or "alienating" elements of public art collections.

In October, discussions in the Netherlands by the Benin Dialogue Group (BDG), composed of representatives of European museums with important African and Nigerian collections, resulted in an agreement to lend artifacts to Nigeria in a period of three years. The artifacts would be housed in the future royal museum of Benin, Nigeria. Much of the artifacts in question were looted in Benin City during a British retaliatory raid in 1897.

The Sarr and Savoy report is not binding and it is unlikely that France will return important works of art to Africa in the near future. Macron is committed to returning 26 artifacts to Benin. But the report, as well as the agreement reached by BDG members, will probably reinvigorate the long-standing debate over the disposition of cultural and art objects acquired as a result of colonialism.

At first glance, the return of European art to Africa from European or American collections is attractive, the restitution of a cultural heritage looted by former colonial masters. Certainly, many African objects had a religious purpose. Native Americans have succeeded in recovering works of art and artifacts from American institutions, especially those of religious value. Likewise, the Greeks have been demanding for years that the British Museum bring back the Elgin marbles to the Parthenon in Athens.

But important problems remain. Too many museums in Africa do not have the resources to protect and protect works of art and artifacts. There are many examples of stolen works in poorly secured African museums. The hyper-monetization of art increases the risk of theft, especially in very poor countries characterized by a high level of corruption. On the other hand, the works of art exhibited at the Musée Quai Branly in Paris, the British Museum in London or the Metropolitan Museum in New York, are secure, protected and easily accessible to the public. There is also the question of where the return of the art should stop. Should the altarpieces of the Italian Renaissance in American museums be automatically returned to Italian churches? Or religious paintings from El Greco to Spanish churches? Or Powhatan's coat, now in England, be sent back to Virginia? It can be argued that Renaissance art, early Dutch masters and African bronzes are part of the world's cultural heritage, not just those of the countries where they were created.