- The protests that followed the death of George Floyd saw numerous statues of historical figures but having contributed to slavery be unbolted by the angry crowd.
- Actions that are now appearing in the United Kingdom and Belgium. In France, rich in glorified person but with controversial past, the question also begins to arise.
- Will the country end up seeing certain polemical statues, like those of Colbert or Jules Ferry, unbolt?
If you decide to go to the National Assembly, you cannot miss it. Seated at the entrance, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, minister under Louis XIV, peering into the distance with his eyes and his stone statue. At least for now. Because the most famous controller general of finance in the 17th century could end up no longer sitting in the open air. A giant in stone and a bump in history, the man did not just manage the accounts of the Sun King well and financially redress the country, he is also the author of the Black Code, a sort of guide to slavery for the French colonies. This crystallizes, at the heart of the debate on racism in France, many tensions around his person ... and his statue.
The statue can be all the more worried about its future if its marble look lingers on the United States. Since the death of George Floyd, protests for more civil rights have been accompanied by some debunking of controversial historical figures. Statues of Christopher Columbus, become a symbol of the genocide of the Indians, were beheaded, others vandalized, the stone hand of our Louis XVI torn away… Not even need to cross the Atlantic for Colbert to be afraid. In Belgium, statues of King Leopold II, colonizer of a large part of Africa in the 19th century, did not resist this passive and the anger of the time. Same fate for statues of slavers in the United Kingdom, unbolted when they were not thrown into the sea.
Many precedents in France
And in France ? The phenomenon is slowly starting to re-emerge. The past of certain historical figures of the country has been debating him for a long time: Napoleon, Colbert therefore, but also Jules Ferry and his declarations on the "superior races" and on the necessity, the very duty, of the colonization "of the inferior races", among others. In fact, rather healthy questions for Dominique Chateau, art philosopher, who recalls that the role of History is also to reconsider without complacency on his characters suspected of slavery or genocide: "This revision of history is fundamental, and it is a sign of good health of the society which has the courage to do so. "
Moreover, the country has not heard the American movement to start destroying statues with shovels and picks here and there, as reminded by the doctor of architecture and heritage specialist Camille Bidaud. In the French Revolution of course, where it was squarely written in the law that it was necessary to cut down the old royal symbols - mainly understanding the fleur-de-lis and the statues of kings -, but also almost every change of regime, of government or at the slightest social movement. Without falling back into the past centuries, still very recently, statues of Victor Schœlcher were destroyed in Martinique by activists demanding the glorification of native heroes of the island instead of metropolitan white figures.
Statues, privileged targets and so symbolic
But why target statues more than other buildings? “Through sculpture, the historical symbolism - in this case slavery - is crystallized in a personality, which makes it a more concrete target. In addition, they are prey all the more obvious as they are in the public square and that it is more and more invested, as shown by Street art, "details Dominique Chateau, who recalls that the statues are subjected as much, if not more, of graffiti than debunking.
Easy targets therefore, and whose symbolic significance is increased tenfold. "An entire monument is much longer and costly to shave, which alternates the symbolism of this destruction by stretching it too much over time," continues Camille Bidaud. There are even whole sections of the Berlin Wall, for lack of having enough men and enough fury to shave everything in 1989. And then smashing the statue is all the more widespread as "these are symbolic acts strong, but that do not kill anyone, ”says the doctor.
Repeated but always contested action
The urge to unbolt could therefore again land in France, an event much more frequent than we think, far from being unique to our time as we can sometimes hear, evidenced by the ancient statues of Joseph Fallen Stalin in the former USSR.
This does not mean that Colbert will necessarily leave his seat in the National Assembly this year or even in this century. If the action is not new, it remains very controversial and contested. Thus, Dominique Chateau seems very undecided on the fate to be reserved for the minister of stone: “One can wonder if it is good to make disappear all the traces of the past, in particular the bad traces. Likewise, we must be able to take into account what is positive and negative in the heritage left by an individual. To eradicate everything out of moralism risks drying up the memory and encouraging the forgetfulness that the revisionists cultivate. "
Go in the direction of History
A point often cited but to which Camille Bidaud opposes. For her, things are clear: yes, Colbert is a historical figure of the country and to unbolt his statue is in no way to erase it from memories. “We will always find its trace in museums, at school or in history books. To unbolt a statue is not to erase the historical trace of a person, but only his celebration. "
Nothing shocking therefore for her if the Bourbon Palace emancipates itself from the Minister, as important as it was. On the contrary, even: "This national story by great illustrious men is very" history of the 19th century, "she explains. Where nowadays, we evoke much more social classes in movement and whole categories of population in place of some providential heroes to study our past. "
For her, to unbolt certain statues in France would be paradoxically going in the direction of History, "a science which is not fixed but is constantly renewed by adapting to its era. History is also thinking about how we represent it, "she defines, taking as an example the absence of female representation in statues or street names, which leads us to think" that women have no not weighed in history, which is of course an ineptitude ”. Camille Bidaud concludes: "The representations of History also write History, it is not embarrassing to question them and to modify them if necessary, on the contrary".
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