History of collections

The museum has launched a research program on the provenance of its collection, starting with Western instruments acquired since 1933 and manufactured before 1945. Following the review of all internal documentation on this corpus (2020-2022), the research will continue in two directions: reconstructing the provenance, instrument by instrument, to identify those that may have been subject to looting during the Nazi period, and identifying the actors in the market from the interwar period to the present.

Additionally, a doctoral thesis focuses on the key figure of the second abolition of slavery, Victor Schoelcher (1804-1893), who also played a role in the history of the formation of ethnographic collections in France. The work examines the role of music and instruments from Africa and the Americas in Schoelcher’s ethnographic, musicological, or political writings, as well as the complex interpretations he made in light of contemporary discussions on slavery, race, and civilization.

Finally, another doctoral project investigates the history of conservation and restoration interventions carried out on ‘non-Western’ musical instruments acquired during the colonial period by museums. This study, based on the analysis of practices through a corpus of lutes preserved at the Musée de la Musique and the Musée du quai Branly, receives support from the National Research Agency under the future investment program integrated into France 2030 (ANR-17-EURE-0021-Fondation des Sciences du Patrimoine).