I took myself out to Tervuren, a suburb of Brussels to the Royal Museum of Central Africa. The building pays homage to King Leopold II, whose main collection of items from the Belgian colony, the Congo Free State started the museum after it was displayed at the 1897 worlds fair. In the park area, villages of Congolese were even erected.
The building is beautiful and it--and the museum's exhibits-- are about to undergo a much needed renovation. I hope so, as I have never been more upset after visiting a museum. The horrible, terrible history of the Belgian Congo has been whitewashed behind statues, taxidermy animals, and busts of King Leopold. There is a display dedicated to Stanely and Dr. Livingstone, and only a few mentions of the rubber tax (even on the audio guide). They have completely ignored the brutality, the cutting off hands, everything. And only one room is even talks about some rioting in 1959 and then Belgium granted Independence in 1960. No mention of how Lamumba, the first prime minister, was brutally murdered, and not a single word about Mubutu. As I said, I have never been more upset or angry after visiting a museum. I sincerely hope that when the museum reopens in several years that the exhibits have been reassessed and re-evaluated; that the celebration of the colonial past will have disappeared and instead a real discussion of what the empire was and meant will be had. No more animal dioramas, pinned insects, or African masks without context of what really happened in the Congo.
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| The impressive rotunda |
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| Of course I had to take a photo of the giraffe. |
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| These Nile Crocodiles have been in this case since the museum opened. |
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| one of the rooms with the original display cabinets |
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| Stanely |
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| The Leopard Man-- a very controversial statue grouping |
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| on the tram back to Brussels |
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