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- 1. Louis Rochet (1813-1878)
Monument of Bertrand-François Mahé de La Bourdonnais
Bronze, stone base
Saint-Denis de la Réunion, now unbolted
Photo : Thierry Caro (CC BY-SA 3.0) - See the image in its page
If only there were a French Ministry of Culture responsible for heritage, that would be a good idea. Unfortunately, the joke is back in the news. Two events have just occurred, two events that we spoke about at length before they actually took place, two defeats for heritage and two victories for vandalism. Both happened under the indifferent, if not complicit eyes of Rima Abdul Malek, the incumbent of the post, who can definitely be classed as a non-existent minister.
The first case is even more serious, because beyond the vandalism, it confirms the broken promises of the President of the Republic, and the complicity of the French State, in other words Emmanuel Macron and Rima Abdul Malak. It is one of those operations to deny history that are part of the multiform movement known as wokism, which its practitioners claim does not exist.
The statue of François Mahé de La Bourdonnais, "one of the most outstanding figures among the French who worked in the Indian Ocean in the eighteenth century" (we did not write this, but the France Archives website bearing the seal of the French Republic), has just been taken down, even though the functionaries of the Regional Department of Cultural Affairs in charge of investigating the case, who were opposed to it, were bypassed by their superiors . The building permit - in this case, a cancellation permit - was examined as a matter of urgency by the architect of the Bâtiments de France (ABF) acting on the orders of the director of cultural affairs for Réunion, who was herself in phase with the prefect. To give the matter some semblance of legality, an interim order was issued for the post of Regional Conservator of Historic Monuments, with retroactive effect, appointing the ABF to the post with effect from 1 September. The incumbent had in fact left the post on that date.
Emmanuel Macron’s martial assertions that "the Republic will not erase any traces" and "it will not unbolt any statues" (see for example here) were therefore nothing more than rodomontade, a lie. The government, which had already allowed activists to destroy Vital-Dubray’s statue of Joséphine de Beauharnais in Fort-de-France, just a stone’s throw from the Prefecture and a police station (see article), took the initiative here and had the sculpture removed itself, so that it could be moved to a place where it could hardly ever be seen again by the public, whether local residents or tourists. In addition to the fact that it was a work of art that had been listed as a historic monument (the classification of which had been decided but never implemented), a square, an urban ensemble that had been created more than a century ago, was destroyed to satisfy the mayor of Réunion and a few activists, while many local personalities were opposed to the idea.
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- 2. Roger-Henri Expert’s Art Deco building
Photo: Didier Rykner - See the image in its page
The Minister for Culture was perfectly aware of this affair, in which she is now an active accomplice. As she is also aware of the destruction that began, at about the same time as the statue was taken down, of Roger-Henri Expert’s Art Deco building on rue Gay-Lussac in Paris, which has been in the news a great deal over the last three months, ever since we revealed in September the threats against it.
After the trees, cut down a few weeks ago, it is now this building by an architect to whom Éditions du Patrimoine is simultaneously devoting a book that has been ruthlessly sacrificed, with no regard for its architectural interest, and without any solution having been sought to enable the Institut Curie to carry out its expansion project in a different way.
Paris City Council is obviously primarily to blame, as it failed to forward to the Ministry of Culture the request for protection made to it by the Commission du Vieux Paris. The ABF are responsible, having made a manifest error of judgement in approving this project. And the Minister of Culture, who had every right to initiate a classification procedure, did nothing because, in the end, she’s not interested.
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- Roger-Henri Expert’s Art Deco building being demolished
Photo: La Tribune de l’Art - See the image in its page
On 17 November, however, the Ministry initiated classification proceedings for the church of Saint-Pierre de Naives-Rosières in the Meuse department, a 19th-century church that still has some of its medieval structure and sculpted and painted decoration. This first measure taken as part of the plan announced by the French President of the Republic to support the religious heritage of small towns is a good thing. But this is just the work that the Ministry should be doing as a matter of routine, not exception. As we have already said, we will only remember a Minister of Culture for what he allowed to be destroyed