Activists take Congolese statue from museum: ‘We bring everything back home’

In the video, one of the activists recalls the atrocities committed by the Dutch in Africa, and the art they allegedly destroyed and stolen there. After a speech of a few minutes, he takes a statue that an accomplice has taken from a display case. Then the five – initially unhindered – walk outside. They grumble about the 15 euros they had to pay to view art from their own continent. They were arrested shortly afterwards. The stolen object, a Congolese grave statue, is back in its old place. The five activists were still detained on Friday afternoon.

The statue targeted by the activists was given to the museum on loan by fathers of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit, who bought it in 1968 (in the then independent Congo) from an art dealer. It is not known how it came into possession of the statue – a problem that often arises in attempts to determine whether museum objects should be classified as ‘looted art’. At the Quai Branly ethnographic museum in Paris, activists – presumably the same ones who struck at the Africa Museum on Thursday – also committed a video theft. They will soon have to answer to a French judge for this.

Stijn Schoonderwoerd, director of the Wereldmuseum (of which the Africa Museum is part), says he is open to discussion about looted art and colonial heritage. ‘However, I cannot regard a criminal offense as a fruitful contribution to that discussion.’ Schoonderwoerd has been involved in drawing up a protocol for dealing with looted art housed in museums of the former colonizers. As a rule, the institutions concerned cannot independently decide on the restitution of objects to the countries of origin. In the Netherlands, Minister Van Engelshoven (Culture) is expected to be advised by a committee next month on suitable destinations for controversial art assets.

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