SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Nearly a decade ago, French President Emmanuel Macron made a radical commitment to return art and cultural objects to Africa. It set off a moment of reckoning across cultural institutions in Europe, but as Emma Jacobs reports, that long-promised pledge seems to have stalled.
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PRESIDENT EMMANUEL MACRON: (Speaking French).
EMMA JACOBS, BYLINE: It was a moment that shook up the museum world in France and beyond.
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MACRON: (Speaking French).
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JACOBS: In this 2017 speech in Burkina Faso, French President Emmanuel Macron said that he would make the return of African heritage to the African continent a priority. French museums alone hold around 90,000 objects from Africa, mostly at the Quai Branly in Paris, but also in other national and regional collections. Emilie Salaberry runs the Museum of Angouleme, a three-hour train ride from Paris.
EMILIE SALABERRY: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: She says Macron's speech and the critical report commissioned in the aftermath were a real wake-up call.
SALABERRY: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: As she takes me around her museum, Salaberry points out the collection of African masks and other items, the foundation of which was donated by just one collector in the 1930s, a local doctor...
SALABERRY: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: ...Who, she says, "never left France, had never traveled." But Salaberry has little information about how these objects reached France - whether they were fairly purchased or, say, looted after battles.
SALABERRY: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: Learning more about the collection's origins has become an urgent priority for museums like Angouleme. But after missing documentation, the biggest hurdle to returns is legislative. Objects in French museum collections belong to the state. They can't be released without Parliament's say-so. Legislation was passed in 2023, making exceptions for human remains and art looted during World War II.
CLAIRE CHASTANIER: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: But Claire Chastanier, who works for the Ministry of Culture, says her colleagues don't think Parliament is ready to pass legislation on objects from the colonial era.
CHASTANIER: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: A talking drum from the Ivory Coast, meant to be the first item returned under a wider bill, has been boxed up and ready to ship for over a year. Chastanier says it will now be returned alone because Parliament can't reach a consensus on what comes next. Cedric Cremiere, who recently published a book called "Beyond Restitutions," says that's partly due to reluctance to confront France's history in Africa.
CEDRIC CREMIERE: There are still some people who are - doesn't really want to talk about what really did happen during the colonial period.
JACOBS: But he does see a huge cultural shift within French museums, many of whom are now more prepared to confront difficult questions about the provenance of their collections. Daniel Abidjo, a graduate student from Benin completing a Ph.D. in France, contributed to ongoing research at the Quai Branly. He looked at a group of 3,000 objects gathered from across sub-Saharan Africa by a French scientific expedition in the early '30s.
DANIEL ABIDJO: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: "On paper," Abidjo says, "an object may be described as a gift."
ABIDJO: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: "But," he says, "within the colonial context, objects may have in fact been gifted under pressure." Still, even if it's agreed an object was obtained illegitimately, it can't be released until Parliament acts. Meanwhile, some African museum professionals express impatience with what they see as a persistent injustice.
EL HADJI MALICK NDJAYE: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: El Hadji Malick Ndiaye, curator at the Theodore Monod Museum in Senegal, says objects should have been returned long ago.
NDJAYE: (Speaking French).
JACOBS: "There are collections with important symbolic value for communities and for their identities, which have left behind gaps and empty spaces. Helping people reconnect with their absent heritage," he says, "is urgent work, even if, for now, much of it remains in European collections." For NPR News, I'm Emma Jacobs in Paris. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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