Saw this at IDFA 2024, the documentary film festival in Amsterdam. It reminded me of a recent visit to Rosenburg Castle in Copenhagen, where lots of ornaments and furniture was displayed, samples out of the collection of former Danish kings. As a not-so-frequent visitor of museums, this was my first confrontation with looted art. (I knew the term in a WW II context, but that is a totally different issue.) And it was by far not my last confrontation, as Denmark was no exception.
I am now perfectly aware that more countries acted similarly in their colonies. In hindsight I should have known better: names like Ivory Coast and Gold Coast are given for a reason to some parts of Africa. Since then, it stayed on my radar, knowing that the inhabitants at the time were not properly paid for those locally made handicraft, nor for mining materials coming out of their soil. Since then, I see contemporary movements to return those artifacts to the original countries, things I was less aware of before.
(Along the same line are parallel movements to offer excuses for past misdeeds around grabbing men and women from African countries, shipping them under harsh circumstances over the ocean, and letting them work under even so harsh conditions without proper pay. It seems a different matter, but it comes forth from a similar abuse of power over former colonies, accompanied by a condescending attitude against other races, and supported by the church, e.g. Pope Nicolaas V writing Dum Diversas in1452.)
It is easy to blindly applaud the return journey of 26 artefacts, going back from Paris to Benin (as the country is called nowadays). This is what we witness in the first half of the documentary. Rather than applauding France's generosity to facilitate this return journey, the 2nd half of this movie shows that it is by far not the last word. Firstly, there is the fact that merely 26 artefacts are just a small fraction of the thousands taken away in past centuries.
Secondly, there is much more to it, like their native languages and cultures that were "stolen" in the past, by actively suppressing all dialects and forcing everyone to speak French, the language of the ruling colonial country France. The current generation in Benin demonstrates this in open discussions on the matters at hand.
All in all, this movie is a welcome contribution to our social perception, at least to mine. It worked for me as an eye opener, broadening the scope of how we utilized our colonies, not only by taking away their natural riches but also by suppressing their local culture.
