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This is one of the many facets of the character: Jacques Chirac was passionate about culture. The former head of state, who died on September 26, was a lover of primitive arts, among others, and never ceased to share this taste for the distant arts, even " forgotten ", with the French. Culture, in all its diversity, is an unsuspected part of his career, a page that will remain forever in history, against the clash of civilizations.
If Jacques Chirac gave the image of man close to the people, swallowing slices of sausage by testing the buttocks of cows in the company of farmers, he was also a man of cultures, in the plural. A passion discovered in 1947, during adolescence, during the visit of the Guimet Museum, a place devoted to Asian arts in Paris. An interest he first kept for him at a time when Europe was a prey to colonialism and Nazism.
" He always tried to hide his interest in culture. It's modesty. It is only progressively that has revealed its interest in China, Japan, the arts first, "told in June 2016 Jean-Jacques Aillagon, former Minister of Culture and close to the former president, on RTL.
However, Jacques Chirac, pacifist in the soul, quickly falls the mask of this taste pronounced for the culture. " Cultural engagement is a passion," he said in 2002. " Passion to learn and to transmit. Passion to give and discover. Passion for oneself, its history, its heritage, its roots and passion for others, that we meet in its beauty and its truth. "
Jacques Chirac, a passionate about primitive arts
The dreamer archaeologist has always been passionate about the Far East where he has made many times and especially for Japan (he went there fifty times) and for the Chinese arts. Amongst other sumos, the former president was also an expert in African primitive arts, Amerindians. He was also passionate about the Arab world, discovered when he was sent as an officer to Algeria (April 1956 - June 1957).
If Jacques Chirac remained for a long time discreet as for this cult which he dedicated to the distant civilizations, he was then put to make understand to the world the importance of these distant cultures in our contemporary world. " More than ever, the fate of the world is there, in the ability of people to bring each other an educated look and dialogue between their differences and their cultures, " he said at the inauguration of the Quai Museum. Branly in June 2006.
But before, throughout his political career, Jacques Chirac gave his time to make cultures live, whether at the inauguration in 1987 of the Institute of the Arab World or hosting in 1989 Raoni Metuktire, emblematic figure of the struggle for the preservation of the Amazon rainforest and indigenous culture; or during exhibitions devoted to Asia (the Chinese bronzes at the Cernuschi museum in 1998, for example), the opening of the Sessions pavilion and the creation of a department of Islamic Arts at the Louvre. And the man to be interested parallel to the mythical characters of his time, such as Claude Lévi-Strauss. He was also a supporter of the ideas of Aimé Césaire and Léopold Sédar Senghor.
As the Musée du Quai Branly recalls, Jacques Chirac's cultural positions are witnesses to the revolution that led 20th century Europe to gradually break away from its ethnocentrism and to consider the cultures of the world with more of interest and respect.
The musée du Quai Branly, a trace of Jacques Chirac for History
Jacques Chirac wanted more than anything: to create in the heart of the capital a place dedicated to the arts and civilizations of Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas. It was born in June 2006.
In 2016, ten years after its inauguration, the museum takes the name of the former president . Quai Branly celebrates its founder by organizing an exhibition entitled "Jacques Chirac or the dialogue of cultures".
A marked path in about fifty key dates symbolizing major landmarks bringing together " the French, European or world political and cultural history of the positions and choices - professional and personal - of the French politician ". These are the photos of human zoos from the garden of acclimatization of Paris at the end of the 21st century which open the way, or how France had in the past relations at least complicated with the non-white peoples.
Dates but also a selection of some 150 works of art (masks, sculptures, paintings, objects, etc.) that trace the discovery by the former head of state masterpieces of different civilizations. The opportunity to remind visitors how " the threads of a personal destiny cross those of the history of extra-European civilizations ". All cultures of all eras are present, a tribute to Jacques Chirac in all its splendor. " Jacques Chirac [was] more comfortable in the distant horizons than in the near realities ", confided Jean-Jacques Aillagon, curator of the exhibition.
Jacques Chirac, who visited the museum discreetly in July 2016 , was " amused " by the traditional Japanese masks, whose resemblance to his caricature is well established, said one of the spokespersons from the museum to AFP. " He was happy to be here, very touched by this gesture of the museum. "
Culture to spread peace
During the inaugural address of the exhibition, François Hollande explained that the former president always had close to him a synoptic table of the universal chronology. Jacques Chirac " wanted this museum project to be also a political project, to affirm the equal rights for the diversity of the cultures of the world, to promote the dialogue of the cultures, thus contributing to the understanding between the peoples, declared Francois Hollande. He had in mind a message to be given in the name of France to this cultural issue : message of openness and message of peace. "
Jacques Chirac was indeed a character who loved cultures, men, sharing, openness to others. He did not envision the world otherwise than pacified. " It is respect for the diversity of cultures and their dialogues that peace depends ," he said.