Royal Museum for Central Africa

After the Congo Free State was recognised by the Berlin Conference of 1884–85, King Leopold II wanted to publicise the civilising mission and the economic opportunities available in his private colony to a wider public, both in Belgium and internationally. After considering other places, the king decided to have a temporary exhibition in his royal estate in Tervuren, just east of Brussels, in today's province of Flemish Brabant.{{sfn|Schroeder-Gudehus|Rasmussen|1992|p=128–131}}{{sfn|Aubry|2000|p=179}}

When the 1897 International Exposition was held in Brussels, a colonial section was built in Tervuren, connected to the city centre by the monumental Avenue de Tervueren/Tervurenlaan. The Brussels–Tervuren tram line 44 was built at the same time as the original museum by Leopold II to bring the visitors from the city centre to the colonial exhibition. The colonial section was hosted in the Palace of the Colonies.{{sfn|Schroeder-Gudehus|Rasmussen|1992|p=128–131}}{{sfn|Aubry|2000|p=179}} The building was designed by the French architect Alfred-Philibert Aldrophe and the classical gardens by the French landscape architect Elie Lainé. In the main hall, known as the Hall of the Great Cultures ({{langx|fr|Salon des Grandes Cultures|link=no}}), the architect and decorator {{illm|Georges Hobé|fr}} designed a distinctive wooden Art Nouveau structure to evoke a Congolese forest, using Bilinga wood, an African tree. The exhibition displayed ethnographic objects, stuffed animals and Congolese export products (e.g. coffee, cacao and tobacco). In the park, a temporary "human zoo"—a copy of an African village—was built, in which 60 Congolese people lived for the duration of the exhibition.Dirk F.E. Thys van den Audenaerde, Musée royal de l'Afrique centrale (in French), Brussels, Crédit communal, coll. "Musea Nostra" (no 32), 1994, p. 8–9 Seven of them, however, did not survive their forced stay in Belgium.{{sfn|Hochschild|1998}}

File:Affiche exposition coloniale Tervuren.jpg|Poster for the colonial section of the 1897 International Exposition

File:Plan de lexposition coloniale 1897 a Tervuren.jpg|Plan of the colonial section of the 1897 World's Fair in Tervuren

File:Tervuren 1897 salon des grandes cultures.jpg|Wooden structure by {{illm|Georges Hobé|fr}} in the Hall of the Great Cultures during the exhibition

File:Village congolais - Exposition Tervuren 1897 (album Alphonse Gautier).jpg|The 'Congolese Village' human zoo during the exhibition

The exhibition's success led to the permanent establishment, in 1898, of the Museum of the Congo ({{langx|fr|Musée du Congo|link=no}}, {{langx|nl|Museum van Kongo|link=no}}), a museum and a scientific institution for the dissemination of colonial propaganda and support for Belgium's colonial activities, and a permanent exhibition was installed in the Palace of the Colonies.{{Cite web|url=https://www.brusselstimes.com/magazine-all-news/43183/a-king-congo-and-a-museum|title=A King, Congo and a Museum |work = The Brussels Times |date=3 July 2017}} A decade later, in 1912, a small, similar museum—the {{ill|African Museum of Namur|fr|Musée africain de Namur}}—was opened in Namur. The museum began to support academic research, but due to the avid collecting of the scientists, the collection soon grew too large for the museum and enlargement was needed. Tervuren, which had become a rich suburb of Brussels, was once again chosen as the location of the enlarged museum. The new museum started construction in 1904 and was designed by the French architect Charles Girault in neoclassical "palace" architecture, reminiscent of the Petit Palais in Paris, with large gardens extending into the Tervuren Forest (a part of the Sonian Forest). It was officially opened in 1910, a year after the death of Leopold II, by his successor, King Albert I, and named the Museum of the Belgian Congo ({{langx|fr|Musée du Congo Belge|link=no}}, {{langx|nl|Museum van Belgisch-Kongo|link=no}}).{{Cite web|title=Museum history {{!}} Royal Museum for Central Africa - Tervuren - Belgium|url=https://www.africamuseum.be/en/discover/history|access-date=2021-03-14|website=www.africamuseum.be}}

The following years saw the consolidation and enlargement of the museum's collections. In 1934, the museum's herbarium was transferred to the National Botanic Garden of Belgium (today's Meise Botanic Garden in Meise, Flemish Brabant). In 1952, the adjective "Royal" was added to the museum's name. In preparation for the 1958 Brussels World's Fair (Expo 58), in 1957, a large building was constructed to accommodate the African personnel working in the exhibition: the {{lang|fr|Centre d'Accueil du Personnel Africain}} (CAPA). In 1960, following the independence of the Congo, the museum's name was changed to its current name: the Royal Museum for Central Africa ({{langx|nl|Koninklijk Museum voor Midden-Afrika|link=no}} or KMMA, {{langx|fr|Musée royal de l'Afrique centrale|link=no}} or MRAC, {{langx|de|Königliches Museum für Zentralafrika|link=no}} or KMZA).{{Cite web|url=https://leading-edge.iac.gatech.edu/aaproceedings/towards-the-renewal-and-the-renovation-of-the-royal-museum-for-central-africa/|title = Towards the Renewal and the Renovation of the Royal Museum for Central Africa}}

File:Musée du Congo, Tervuren, Belgium; one of five interior scen Wellcome V0014542.jpg|The interior of the original exhibit in the Palace of the Colonies

File:Algemeens Wereldtentoonstelling van Brussel 1910 - Koloniale Afdeeling Park van Tervueren (imp. E. & H. Mertens).jpg|Poster for the colonial section of the Brussels International Exposition of 1910

File:Homme-léopard (Tervueren).jpg|The museum's Leopard Man statue, from Le Monde colonial illustré (1934)

File:Musée royal de l'Afrique centrale-Portail (1).jpg|Portal of the Royal Museum for Central Africa (Dutch name shown)

By the turn of the millennium, the museum was in need of a thorough renovation. The more than 100-year-old central building was no longer adapted to the needs of a current museum operation. Besides, the permanent exhibition was outdated and its presentation not very critical of the colonial history. A new scenography was thus urgently required.

A global master plan was drawn up in 2007 for the entire site. The Belgian Buildings Agency entrusted the plan to the Temporary Association Stéphane Beel Architects (TV SBA). In late 2013, the museum was closed to allow a major renovation of its exhibits and an extension. The Belgian Government spent €66 million on the museum's modernisation. The exhibition area was increased from {{convert|6,000|m2|abbr=on}} to {{convert|11,000|m2|abbr=on}}, while presenting fewer pieces; 700 against 1,400 previously (out of a total of 180,000 objects preserved). The additional space allowed contemporary art from Central Africa to be displayed alongside the original colonial exhibits.{{Cite news|url=https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-belgium-museum-africa-idUKKCN1IX540|title=King Leopold's ghost - Belgium's Africa museum to reopen|newspaper=Reuters|date=June 1, 2018|via=uk.reuters.com}}{{dead link|date=September 2024|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}} Renamed AfricaMuseum, the museum was reopened on 9 December 2018. The statue of King Leopold II that once stood in the Great Rotunda was replaced with a sculpture by DRC-born artist, Aimé Mpane.{{cite news | url=https://www.npr.org/2018/09/02/644085214/belgian-museum-looks-at-countrys-history-of-colonialism-and-racism | title=Belgian Museum Looks At Country's History Of Colonialism And Racism | work=NPR | date=September 2, 2018 | accessdate=November 29, 2023 | author=Kakissis, Joanna}} Some of the colonial statues once displayed in the museum were moved in 2023 to areas where only guided tours visit.{{cite news | url=https://www.brusselstimes.com/595740/africa-museum-removes-several-colonial-statues-from-its-tour-route | title=Africa Museum removes several colonial statues from its tour route | work=The Brussels Times | date=July 11, 2023 | accessdate=November 29, 2023}}

File:Royal Museum for Central Africa Interior 1.jpg|The interior of the museum, photographed in 2011, shortly before its major renovation

File:Tervuren, Royal Museum for Central Africa, renovation (3).jpg|The museum's main building during the 2013–2018 renovation

File:KMMA.JPG|Old museum entrance through the garden with the restored dome

File:Studiedag Familievriendelijk erfgoed (47941725828).jpg|The Great Rotunda in 2019, featuring the artwork New Breath, or the Burgeoning Congo by Aimé Mpane

The current AfricaMuseum complex consists of six buildings. The centrally located main building houses the permanent exhibitions. It was built under Leopold II by the French architect Charles Girault. The building is {{convert|125|m}} long and {{convert|75|m}} wide. The façade is decorated in the style of the neoclassical French grand palaces. On the right (south-west) side of this imposing building is the Executive Pavilion, and on the left (north-east), the Stanley Pavilion, which houses the entire Stanley Archive. The former Palace of the Colonies (now the Africa Palace) has been transformed into a reception centre, media library and banquet hall.{{Cite web|title=Palais des Colonies - Lieu de prestige au coeur de Tervuren|url=https://www.palaisdescolonies.be/|access-date=2021-03-14|website=Palais des Colonies|language=fr-BE}} The {{lang|fr|Centre d'Accueil du Personnel Africain}} (CAPA) building, erected in 1957 for the African staff, houses several scientific departments.

Following the museum's complete renovation, a part of the previously scattered archives are now presented in new on-site exhibition spaces. A reception pavilion, newly built in 2016, between the management building and the Palace of Africa, functions as the entrance building. In this building are the ticket offices, cloakrooms, a shop, a restaurant, as well as a picnic area for children. An underground gallery leads from the reception building into the existing museum building. This space is also used for temporary exhibitions. In the museum's enclosed courtyard, a sunken garden with a light shaft was added, bringing light to this underground level.

File:Palais des Colonies (Tervuren) 03.JPG|Africa Palace (former Palace of the Colonies) (Aldrophe, 1897)

File:Koninklijk Museum voor Midden-Afrika in Tervuren 01.jpg|Main museum building (Girault, 1905–1910)

File:Pavillon de Stanley-Tervuren (3).jpg|Stanley Pavilion

File:Tervuren, Centre d'Accueil du Personnel Africain.jpg|{{lang|fr|Centre d'Accueil du Personnel Africain}} (CAPA) building (1957)

File:Entrance building Royal Central African Museum.jpg|New entrance pavilion (2018)

The AfricaMuseum houses collections that are unique in the world, of which only a small proportion can be exhibited. According to the museum's website,{{cite web|title=Unique and priceless heritage An overview of our collections|url=http://www.africamuseum.be/museum/collections/general/index_html|publisher=africamuseum.be|access-date=10 November 2012}} the objects and animals on display in the main building make up less than 5% of the total museum's collection:

• The Department of Zoology has over 10,000,000 specimens, including 6,000,000 insects and 1,000,000 fish.
• The Department of Geology and Mineralogy holds more than 56,000 wood samples in its xylotheque, as well as 200,000 rock samples and 17,000 minerals.
• The Department of Cultural Anthropology can boast of 120,000 ethnographic objects (1,600 of which are in the exhibition rooms). The ethnomusicology collection comprises 8,000 musical instruments, as well as 2,500 hours of recordings of traditional music from sub-Saharan Africa, in particular in Central Africa (Congo, Rwanda and Burundi), of which the oldest dates back to 1910 (wax Edison scrolls). Additionally, more than 500,000 films and photos are kept in the film and photo libraries.
• Finally, the Department of History and General Scientific Services manages thousands of historical objects and 350 archives, including some of Henry Morton Stanley's journals. Some of the collections are digitally accessible.

The herbarium collection of the then-Congo Museum was transferred to that of the National Botanic Garden of Belgium in 1934.

File:Statues funéraires Mboma-Africa Museum.jpg|Ntadi (Mintadi) funerary statues, Mboma culture, northern Angola (left) and central Congo (right), late 19th century

File:Receptacle for funeral donations - Ashanti - Royal Museum for Central Africa - DSC06953.JPG|Terracotta receptacle for funeral donations from the tomb of King Prempeh I, Ashanti culture, Ghana

File:Statue emumu Lyembe représentant un lion-Musée royal de l'Afrique centrale (1).jpg|Emumu statue representing a lion, made of wood and plant fibres, Lyembe culture, western Congo, {{circa|1951}}

File:Everything passes, except the past (DSCF3558).jpg|Long dugout canoe used by King Leopold III in the Congo and offered by the inhabitants of Ubundu. Installed in the entrance of the renovated museum.{{Cite web|title=The long dugout canoe|url=https://www.africamuseum.be/en/learn/provenance/canoe|access-date=2022-01-02|website=Royal Museum for Central Africa - Tervuren - Belgium|language=en}}

The museum stores archives documenting its own institutional history, as well as archives of private businesses, organisations, and individuals.{{cite journal |title=Africanist Archival Research in Brussels |author1= Carol Dickerman |author2= David Northrup |journal= History in Africa |volume= 9 |pages= 359–365 |jstor=3171618 |year= 1982 |doi= 10.2307/3171618 |s2cid= 161432913 }}{{sfn|Van Schuylenbergh|1997}} As of 2018, online finding aids exist for archives of Lieutenant-General {{illm|Alphonse Cabra|fr}}, musicologist Paul Collaer, geologist {{illm|Jules Cornet|fr}}, Commandant Francis Dhanis, Governor-General of the Belgian Congo Félix Fuchs, Lieutenant-General Cyriaque Gillain, General-Major {{ill|Josué Henry de la Lindi|fr|Josué Henry}}, explorer Charles Lemaire, American explorer Richard Mohun, Colonel Emmanuel Muller, German explorer Paul Reichard, Captain Albert Sillye, British explorer Henry Morton Stanley, soldier and explorer Émile Storms, Vice-Governor General of the Congo Free State Alphonse van Gèle, historian Jan Vansina, territorial administrator Auguste Verbeken, historian Benoît Verhaegen, Commandant Gustave Vervloet, as well as the railway enterprises Compagnie du chemin de fer du bas-Congo au Katanga (BCK) and {{illm|Groupe Empain|fr}}.{{cite web |url=http://www.africamuseum.be/collections/archives/index_html?set_language=en&cl=en |access-date= 13 October 2017 |title= Collections: Archives |publisher= Royal Museum for Central Africa }}

The publicly accessible exhibitions only represent about 25 percent of the museum's activities.{{Cite web|title=Discover our research|url=https://www.africamuseum.be/en/research/discover|access-date=2022-01-02|website=Royal Museum for Central Africa - Tervuren - Belgium|language=en}} The scientific departments, which represent the bulk of the museum's academic and research facilities, together with the main collections, are housed in the former Palace of the Colonies, the Stanley Pavilion and in the CAPA building.

There are 4 departments:

• Department of Cultural Anthropology
• Ethnography
• Archaeology and Prehistory
• Linguistics and Ethnomusicology
• Anthropology and Ethnohistory
• Department of Geology and Mineralogy
• General Geology
• Mineralogy and Petrography
• Cartography and Photo interpretation
• Physical and Mineral chemistry
• Department of Zoology
• Vertebrates (Ornithology, Ichthyology, Herpetology, Osteology and Mammalogy)
• Entomology
• Invertebrates non-insects (Arachnology, Myriapodology, Acarology)
• Department of History and General Scientific Services
• History of the Colonial Period
• Contemporary History
• Agricultural and Forest economics (Geomorphology, Laboratory of Wood Biology)

The museum also maintains a library of some 130,000 titles.{{cite web |url=http://www.africamuseum.be/museum/research/libraries/library-catalogues |title= Library collection |access-date= 9 October 2017 |publisher=Royal Museum for Central Africa }} In the context of discussions about the restitution of cultural objects in museum collections of colonial origin, the AfricaMuseum started to publicly present information about the provenance of such objects in its permanent exhibition in 2021.{{Cite web|title=Provenance of the collections|url=https://www.africamuseum.be/en/learn/provenance|access-date=2022-01-01|website=Royal Museum for Central Africa - Tervuren - Belgium|language=en}}

File:Museum central Africa monument Luc Viatour.jpg, 1997) in the museum's gardens{{Cite web |date=2020-05-21 |title=The Congo, I Presume ? – Tervuren {{!}} BE-monumen |url=https://be-monumen.be/patrimoine-belge/the-congo-i-presume-tervuren/ |access-date=2022-10-30 |website=be-monumen.be |language=fr-FR}}]]

There has been controversy surrounding the Royal Museum for Central Africa. It had previously been called a museum that "has remained frozen in time". No mention was made of the pillage of resources and atrocities in the Congo Free State, nor during Belgium's larger colonial era. The Guardian reported in July 2002 that, after initial outrage by Belgian historians over the popular history book King Leopold's Ghost by Adam Hochschild that gives his view of the Congo Free State in what some critics called a "tendentious diatribe", the state-funded museum would finance an investigation into Hochschild's allegations.{{Citation needed|date=November 2021}}

The resulting, more modern exhibition The Memory of Congo (February–October 2005) tried to tell the story of the Congo Free State before it became a Belgian colony and a less one-sided view of the Belgian colonial era.{{Cite web|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/belgian-museum-faces-up-to-its-brutal-colonial-legacy-8973870.html|title=Belgian museum faces up to its brutal colonial legacy|last=McDonald-Gibson|first=Charlotte|date=2013-11-29|website=The Independent|language=en-GB|access-date=2016-05-17}} The exhibition was praised by the international press, with French newspaper Le Monde claiming that "the museum has done better than revisit a particularly stormy page in history...[it] has pushed the public to join it in looking into the reality of colonialism."{{cite news|title=La Belgique confrontée à la violence de son aventure coloniale au Congo|url=https://www.lemonde.fr/culture/article/2005/02/25/la-belgique-confrontee-a-la-violence-de-son-aventure-coloniale-au-congo_399580_3246.html |access-date=20 Aug 2023| newspaper=Le Monde|date=26 February 2005}} Hochschild himself had a mixed critique of the renovated museum.{{cite web |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/01/when-museums-have-ugly-pasts/603133/ |title=The Fight to Decolonize the Museum |author=Adam Hochschild |date=15 December 2019 |publisher=The Atlantic |access-date=2020-08-06}}

{{wide image|RoyalMuseumOfAfrica_vrv14May11.jpg|1500px|Panoramic view of the Royal Museum for Central Africa's main building and gardens}}

{{Portal|Belgium}}

• Atrocities in the Congo Free State
• Belgian Federal Science Policy Office (BELSPO)
• Brussels Anti-Slavery Conference 1889–90
• Brussels Conference Act of 1890
• Archives Africaines of the Belgian SPF Affaires étrangères, Commerce extérieur et Coopération au Développement
• Belgium in the long nineteenth century

{{Reflist}}

• {{cite book |editor=Verswijver|display-editors=etal|title= Masterpieces from Central Africa |year=1995

}}

• {{citation |author=Patricia Van Schuylenbergh |title= La mémoire des Belges en Afrique; Inventaire des archives historiques privées du Musée royal de l'Afrique centrale de 1858 a nos jours |url= http://www.africamuseum.be/collections/museum/collections/docs/memoiredesbelges.pdf |isbn=2-87398-006-0 |number=8 |language=fr |year= 1997

|ref= {{harvid|Van Schuylenbergh|1997}}

}} {{free access}}

• {{cite book |editor= Toma Muteba Luntumbue & Claire Ponas |title=EXITCONGOMUSEUM/Contemporary Art |year=2001

}}

;in English

• {{Citation |publisher = Karl Baedeker |location = Leipzig |title = Belgium and Holland |edition=15th |date = 1910 |oclc = 397759

|chapter-url = https://archive.org/stream/belgiumhollan00karl#page/146/mode/2up |via=Internet Archive

|chapter=Tervueren |quote=Congo Museum}}

• {{cite journal |journal=Research in African Literatures |volume =34 |title=Ghost of Leopold II: The Belgian Royal Museum of Central Africa and Its Dusty Colonialist Exhibition |author= Jean Muteba Rahier |year= 2003}}
• {{cite journal |title='Indépendance!': The Belgo-Congolese Dispute in the Tervuren Museum |author=Véronique Bragard |journal= Human Architecture |issn=1540-5699 |year= 2011}}
• {{cite journal |title=Visualizing trauma: the Belgian Museum for Central Africa and its discontents |author=Patrick Hoenig |journal=Postcolonial Studies |issn=1466-1888 |publisher= Institute of Postcolonial Studies, Melbourne |volume=17 |year= 2014}}

;in other languages

• {{cite journal |author=Anne-Marie Bouttiaux |title= Des mises en scène de curiosités aux chefs-d'œuvre mis en scène. Le Musée royal de l'Afrique à Tervuren: un siècle de collections |journal=Cahiers d'Études africaines |volume=39 |issue= 155 |pages= 595–616 |doi= 10.3406/cea.1999.1768 |language=fr |via= Persee.fr |year= 1999}} {{free access}}
• {{cite book |author=Maarten Couttenier |title= Congo Tentoongesteld. Een geschiedenis van de Belgische antropologie en het Museum van Tervuren (1882-1925) |language=nl |location= Leuven |publisher= {{illm|Uitgeverij Acco|nl}} |oclc=650023048 |year= 2005}}
• {{cite book |editor= Vincent Viaene |isbn=9789058677716 |title=Congo in België: koloniale cultuur in de metropool |language=nl |year= 2009 |chapter=De impact van Congo in het Museum van Belgisch Congo in Tervuren (1897-1946) |author=Maarten Couttenier}}

• {{cite book|last=Aubry|first=Françoise|chapter=L'exposition de Tervueren en 1897 : scénographie Art nouveau et arts primitifs|title=Bruxelles carrefour de cultures|location=Brussels|language=fr|publisher=Mercator|year=2000|isbn=978-90-6153-457-0}}
• {{cite book|last=Hochschild|first=Adam|author-link=Adam Hochschild|title=King Leopold's Ghost|location=Boston|publisher=Mariner Books|year=1998|isbn=978-0-358-21250-8}}
• {{cite book|last1=Schroeder-Gudehus|first1=Brigitte|last2=Rasmussen|first2=Anne|title=Les fastes du progrès : le guide des expositions universelles 1851-1992|location=Paris|language=fr|publisher=Flammarion|year=1992|isbn=978-2-08-012617-7}}

• {{Commons category-inline|Royal Museum for Central Africa}}
• [http://www.africamuseum.be Official museum site]
• [http://music.africamuseum.be/ Collection etnomusicology]

{{Authority control}}

Category:African diaspora in Belgium

Category:Museums in Flemish Brabant

Category:Natural history museums

Category:African art museums

Category:Museums established in 1898

Category:1898 establishments in Belgium

Category:Ethnographic museums in Europe

Category:Art museums and galleries in Belgium

Category:Forestry museums

Category:Forestry in Belgium

Category:Central Africa

Category:Organisations based in Belgium with royal patronage

Category:Tervuren

Category:Leopold II of Belgium

Category:Belgian colonisation in Africa

Category:Congo Free State

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Category:World's fair architecture in Belgium