Bénédicte Savoy

Beauty belongs to no one. But what about the objects that museums celebrate as great works of art: to whom do they belong? Do they belong to the places where they originated? To the cultures whose genius they embody? To the enlightened collectors who saw their value and appropriated them? Or to the whole of humanity which has access to them through institutions dedicated to their preservation? And if the latter, how can we justify the fact that some people are able to enjoy what is supposed to be a universally shared heritage while others cannot? We can begin to answer these questions, argues Bénédicte Savoy, by examining how these objects actually came to be with us and what their journeys reveal about our history and its violence and asymmetries, both symbolic and real. These objects have no doubt left their mark on the places where they arrived; they have also left wounds that are still raw in the places from which they came. The bust of Nefertiti, the Great Pergamon Altar, the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, the Sistine Madonna, the Old Summer Palace bronze heads, Watteau’s L'Enseigne de Gersaint, the Bangwa Queen, Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer, the Benin Bronzes: through the journeys of these iconic works, Savoy reflects on desire and domination, on rupture and restitution, and on the profound emotions evoked by beauty when it is laced with pain of historical loss. This timely and highly original reflection on beauty, provenance, power and loss will be essential reading for those concerned with the preservation and restitution of cultural objects and it will appeal to anyone interested in art, culture and politics today.

A major new history of how African nations, starting in the 1960s, sought to reclaim the art looted by Western colonial powers For decades, African nations have fought for the return of countless works of art stolen during the colonial era and placed in Western museums. In Africa’s Struggle for Its Art, Bénédicte Savoy brings to light this largely unknown but deeply important history. One of the world’s foremost experts on restitution and cultural heritage, Savoy investigates extensive, previously unpublished sources to reveal that the roots of the struggle extend much further back than prominent recent debates indicate, and that these efforts were covered up by myriad opponents. Shortly after 1960, when eighteen former colonies in Africa gained independence, a movement to pursue repatriation was spearheaded by African intellectual and political classes. Savoy looks at pivotal events, including the watershed speech delivered at the UN General Assembly by Zaire’s president, Mobutu Sese Seko, which started the debate regarding restitution of colonial-era assets and resulted in the first UN resolution on the subject. She examines how German museums tried to withhold information about their inventory and how the British Parliament failed to pass a proposed amendment to the British Museum Act, which protected the country's collections. Savoy concludes in the mid-1980s, when African nations enacted the first laws focusing on the protection of their cultural heritage. Making the case for why restitution is essential to any future relationship between African countries and the West, Africa’s Struggle for Its Art will shape conversations around these crucial issues for years to come.

A major new history of how African nations, starting in the 1960s, sought to reclaim the art looted by Western colonial powers For decades, African nations have fought for the return of countless works of art stolen during the colonial era and placed in Western museums. In Africa’s Struggle for Its Art, Bénédicte Savoy brings to light this largely unknown but deeply important history. One of the world’s foremost experts on restitution and cultural heritage, Savoy investigates extensive, previously unpublished sources to reveal that the roots of the struggle extend much further back than prominent recent debates indicate, and that these efforts were covered up by myriad opponents. Shortly after 1960, when eighteen former colonies in Africa gained independence, a movement to pursue repatriation was spearheaded by African intellectual and political classes. Savoy looks at pivotal events, including the watershed speech delivered at the UN General Assembly by Zaire’s president, Mobutu Sese Seko, which started the debate regarding restitution of colonial-era assets and resulted in the first UN resolution on the subject. She examines how German museums tried to withhold information about their inventory and how the British Parliament failed to pass a proposed amendment to the British Museum Act, which protected the country's collections. Savoy concludes in the mid-1980s, when African nations enacted the first laws focusing on the protection of their cultural heritage. Making the case for why restitution is essential to any future relationship between African countries and the West, Africa’s Struggle for Its Art will shape conversations around these crucial issues for years to come.

Who owns cultural assets? Who has narrative control? What could fair and just approaches to dislocations of cultural assets look like, independently of restitution? Discussions about historical appropriation practices for cultural assets in the context of their associated relocation are highly topical and widely reflected across different academic disciplines. Such questions increasingly concern those who work in the art market, museums, politics and the media, scholars from diverse disciplines, as well as artists and writers. This volume examines the translocations as such, which rarely come into focus. The contributions address the people involved, the related traumas, discourses, gestures, techniques, and representations.

Wer erinnert sich heute noch an die zahlreichen Dokumentarfilme, die zwischen 1934 und 1939 in den Berliner Museen, ihren Depots und Restaurierungswerkstatten gedreht und uberall in Europa, von Venedig uber Rom, Paris und London, mit grossem Erfolg gezeigt wurden? Als zeitgeschichtliche Zeugnisse beleuchten sie nicht nur die asthetische und politische Verortung der Berliner Museen zwischen nationalsozialistischer Propaganda und Experimentieren mit kinematographischen Mitteln. In ihrer Art fur die deutsche Museumslandschaft einzigartig zeigen sie zudem am Beispiel Berlins das Museum als historisch gewachsenen Ort des kulturellen Konsums und des technischen Konservierens von Kunstwerken. Lange galten die Filme als verschollen. Benedicte Savoy hat sie wiederentdeckt und geht in diesem Buch ihrer Geschichte nach.