English version of the temporary exhibition

I-Museums and Conservation in Storerooms

A-Museums and their Function

“The Museum must be the unfolding of the great riches that the nation possesses in drawings, paintings, sculptures, and other monuments of art. As I conceive it, it must attract foreigners and hold their attention. It must cultivate a taste for the Fine Arts, provide recreation for connoisseurs, and serve as a school for artists. It must be open to everyone.”
— Letter from Minister of the Interior Roland to the painter David about the creation of the Louvre, October 17, 1792.

Formulated at the close of the eighteenth century, this vision laid the foundations of the major role the museum was destined to assume within society. In our own time, this mission has considerably expanded and deepened, embracing new dimensions and responsibilities. It is therefore fitting to reflect on the fundamental functions that a museum such as ours is called upon to fulfil today. Inherited from a long historical evolution, these missions are manifold: they encompass the preservation of heritage, scientific research, the transmission of knowledge, and cultural mediation.

Before examining their concrete applications, a preliminary question arises: what is a museum, and what are its functions? At the international level, the International Council of Museums (ICOM) provides an authoritative contemporary definition:
“A museum is a permanent, non-profit institution in the service of society, dedicated to research, collection, conservation, interpretation, and exhibition of tangible and intangible heritage. Open to the public, accessible and inclusive, it fosters diversity and sustainability.”
This general definition finds diverse applications across national contexts. Unlike many national museums, the Château Vodou Museum is managed by a non-profit association and is therefore reliant upon a fragile economic model. Today, it receives less than ten percent of its funding from public subsidies and must largely sustain itself through ticketing revenue and the generosity of its patrons and visitors.

Within the French national framework, the organisation and functioning of museums are governed by legislative and regulatory provisions codified in Book IV of the Code du Patrimoine. This code defines the museum and its mission as follows:
“A museum shall be considered as any permanent collection composed of objects whose conservation and presentation are of public interest, and which is organised for the purposes of knowledge, education, and public enjoyment.”

In accordance with the principles underpinning the museum sector, our institution endeavours to fulfil a permanent mission that constitutes the shared foundation of all museums in France. This includes rigorous conservation, meticulous restoration, in-depth research, and the continuous enrichment of the collections entrusted to us. Complementing these activities are the design and implementation of educational and cultural mediation programmes, aimed at ensuring equitable access to culture for all. At our modest scale, we also aspire to contribute actively to the advancement of knowledge and research in our field.

Moreover, a museum is not solely a repository of heritage; it is also a privileged vehicle for the promotion of fundamental values such as openness, sharing, and tolerance — transcending its strictly patrimonial role. In this spirit, our museum places great importance on cultural exchange and collaborates closely with researchers, artists, institutions, and official representatives from West Africa in the framework of our cultural and scientific programming.

Finally, a museum is also a space of emotion, where the sacred artistry of objects is encountered, and where sensitive dialogues unfold between works, visitors, and the cultures they embody.

E. Matt-Gehringer

B-Storage Rooms: An invisible yet essential Heart

The management of a museum’s entire collection relies in large part on specific spaces known as storerooms, which play an essential role in the preservation and valorisation of heritage. By storerooms, one understands specially designed and secured areas in which objects not on display are kept.
On average, only 5 to 20 percent of a museum’s holdings are exhibited to the public. The remainder — between 80 and 95 percent — is conserved within storerooms, shielded from view. These technical spaces are indispensable to the proper functioning of a museum. Far from being static, they actively contribute to the management, study, and preservation of heritage. Not all objects can be permanently displayed: some are too fragile, others do not correspond to the logic of current exhibitions, while others still await study, restoration, or deeper understanding. Their presence in storage is not neglect, but another form of museal existence — one that unfolds within a logic of circulation and long temporality.
Thus, while the permanent exhibition Vodou: The Art of Seeing Differently presents 220 objects, it represents only a partial glimpse of the Arbogast Collection, which comprises more than 1,500 unique pieces housed at the Château Vodou. A significant portion of this collection therefore remains in storage, protected and generally inaccessible to the wider public.

Living Storerooms are not mere spaces of passive storage. They enable conservation, the study of objects through processes of collection, identification, and cataloguing, as well as their management for all forms of dissemination — whether through exhibitions, publications, or events. They must remain accessible, organised, and dynamic, allowing works to be mobilised swiftly for research, restoration, loans, or new displays. This involves responding to the constraints of the objects themselves — their materials, state of preservation, and specific needs — as well as those of the museum teams. It is a true art of balance, at the intersection of patrimonial demands, spatial logic, and human constraints.
Moreover, storerooms sustain an organic connection with the museum staff — registrars, restorers, and curators — who ensure their daily life. The registrar organises spaces, plans object movements, and supervises safe transport. The restorer conducts condition reports, performs delicate cleaning, or stabilises fragile materials. The curator studies and documents pieces, situating them within their scientific and patrimonial context. Alongside them, photographers and documentalists enrich the memory of the collections through photographic campaigns and inventories.

These are also spaces of professional encounter, where technical knowledge, material culture, and living memory intersect. Storerooms host researchers and students observing and comparing objects, museum partners examining works in preparation for loans, and interns training in conservation and collection management techniques. In this sense, storerooms emerge as genuine places of vitality, where technical expertise, cultural heritage, and living memory converge.

E. Matt-Gehringer et C. Elsensohn

C-Conservation Techniques: Constant Vigilance

Work within the storerooms mobilises a wide range of preventive conservation techniques, all designed to ensure optimal and stable conditions for the long-term preservation of the objects. These practices encompass several essential aspects:

• Climate control (constant temperature and humidity)
• Monitoring of biological infestations (insects, mould)
• Air filtration and protection against dust
• Restricted or absent lighting to prevent material deterioration
• Appropriate storage furniture and packaging (supports, shelving, custom cases)
• Secure handling protocols (gloves, established procedures, safe transport)

At the Musée Vodou, we endeavour to bring together all of these ideal conditions. This requirement is particularly crucial for a collection composed largely of organic materials (wood, plant fibres, sacrificial matter), which are extremely sensitive to climatic variations.
Storerooms also function as technical and scientific centres: photography, digitisation, restoration, conditioning, and research are carried out here on a daily basis. To the physical movement of objects is added a digital movement, through rigorous documentation that ensures both traceability and the memory of the collections.

The location and layout of storerooms must equally meet strict criteria of security and accessibility. They must avoid risk-prone zones, while allowing for handling and treatment operations. Above all, environmental stability is decisive: it is sudden variations — rather than fixed values — that pose the greatest danger to composite objects.
Storerooms thus appear as genuine technical and mediation spaces, where objects and the teams charged with their protection are in constant interaction.
Faced with such conservation requirements, and with a project such as ours, pressing questions naturally arise — foremost among them: how can accessibility and the security of collections in storage be reconciled? To address this, we have chosen to adopt the Canadian RE-ORG method, supported by UNESCO, which relies on ten quality criteria for the reorganisation of storerooms.

C. Elsensohn 

II-The Collection and its Context

A-Geographic Distribution of Vodou Cults – The “Aja-Tado” Area

The geographic zone inhabited by populations practising the Vodou religion is located in West Africa along the coasts of the Gulf of Guinea. These territories extend inland in Togo and Benin — from the sandy shores interspersed with lagoons in the south, up to approximately 120 to 150 kilometres northward, between the 6th and 8th parallels.
The populations inhabiting these territories speak languages of the Gbe group, derived from Aja-Gbe, which evolved over time through contact with other peoples encountered during the major Adja migrations of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Gbe languages form a subdivision of the “Kwa” branch, itself part of the Niger-Congo language family.

The Guinean climate in the southern zones of these countries is of the humid tropical type, with four distinct seasons: two rainy seasons, from March to July and from September to November; and two dry seasons, from July to September and from December to March. During this latter dry season, a dry, cold wind known as the harmattan blows insistently from the desert, moving from northeast to south.

The region is supplied by a hydrographic system flowing from north to south. In Togo: the Haho and the Oti rivers. The Mono River, 350 kilometres in length, forms much of the border between Togo and Benin before flowing into the Atlantic at Grand-Popo. The Couffo feeds Lake Ahémé in its lower course. Finally, the Ouémé — the longest at 450 kilometres — reinforced by the Zou River, opens into two outlets: one into the lagoon of Porto-Novo, and the other into Lake Nokoué. These waterways played a major role in the circulation of goods and populations until the early twentieth century.

The lagoons behind the sandy coastline form a system whose commercial role proved vital for the populations who settled there between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries. These groups originated from the Adja Plateau, centred around the sacred city of Tado and stretching southwards towards the outskirts of Lokossa. This lagoon system covers almost the entire length of the coastal lands (see maps of rivers and lagoons).
Agriculture, ironworking, trade, and hunting were the four ancestral activities upon which the culture and religiosity of the Aja-Tado peoples were built. For centuries, these activities provided subsistence and sustained exchange with neighbouring populations spread throughout the Niger River basin.

In this, the geographic realities of this zone — climate, topography, hydrography, and demography — shaped patterns of mobility and defined modes of exchange, enabling access first to major overland and riverine trade routes, then to lagoon networks, and finally to maritime routes with the arrival of Europeans. Within this framework, religious influences developed in the course of migrations, the rise and fall of states, conflicts, and constraints linked to commercial activities — access to rivers and the sea, navigating difficult terrain such as marshes and dense forests, seasonal hazards — and were further shaped by the slave trade and later by colonial resource exploitation.

JY. Anézo

B- Origins, Migrations, and Religious Reconfigurations in the Aja-Tado Area

According to oral tradition, the writings of early explorers, and subsequent ethno-historical studies conducted during and after the colonial period, the sacred city of Tado — the birthplace of future dynasties that would reign over the region — was founded between the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The Aja are said to descend from a migrating group originating in the east, whose king was a descendant of the first divine king of Ilé-Ifè, the Yoruba sacred city and major industrial and commercial crossroads. The divine kings of Tado, known as Anyigban fyo — “king of the earth” — have borne the name Aja, from the first ruler to the last.

Some historians suggest that the founding ancestor may have originated from the Songhai Empire, in present-day Niger, travelling first to the Yoruba city of Oyo, before proceeding to Kétou and ultimately Tado. Another ancestor, named Zâ, is said to have settled in Tado after departing from Ouagadougou. This dual migration, combined with encounters with the indigenous populations, formed the seed of what would later become the Aja peoples (see migration map). It is noteworthy that Yoruba influence was significant in shaping the cultural foundations of populations within the Adja sphere.

Between the twelfth and seventeenth centuries, societies of the Aja-Tado cultural area embarked from their capital on a series of formative migrations toward territories situated along the eastern and western coasts. These movements gave rise to new political entities, among them the kingdoms of Notsé, Glidji, Ouidah, Allada, Dahomey (with its capital at Abomey), and Porto-Novo. This process was accompanied by a reconfigured transmission of religious structures, rooted in the cult of the vodoun: cosmic entities, spirits of nature, and deified ancestral figures. The divinities of one people became those of another, through appropriation, exchange, dynastic alliances, or conquest.

These migrations — driven by dynastic competition, territorial expansion, and ecological pressures — constitute a foundational moment in the ethnogenesis of these peoples, later classified according to their linguistic affiliation within the Gbe group: Aja-Ewe and Aja-Fon (see linguistic distribution map).

The first encounter between the Portuguese — European Catholic Christians — and the Aja-Ɔfla, African worshippers of Vodou, took place in 1472. On this occasion, the Portuguese entrusted their flag of the Order of Christ to the custody of the Adja-Ɔfla. In Aja religious thought, the sea was regarded as a realm reserved for the dead. The shock of seeing living men arrive from the south, by sea — white men, moreover, who by association were believed to have come from the northern deserts — was profound, leaving an indelible mark upon their beliefs.

From the sixteenth century onwards, the adaptability of Vodou beliefs facilitated their diffusion throughout the Americas and the Caribbean, within the enslaved societies of the continent, where they assumed new forms. A syncretism emerged through contact with Indigenous peoples, European Christians, and in Brazil, with spiritist currents. In this melting pot, several religious variations evolved, like Cuban Santería, Haitian Vodou, Brazilian Umbanda, and Candomblé — all retaining strong symbolic continuity with their West African matrices.

JY. Anézo

C-“To collect is to be able to live from one’s past.” — Albert Camus

The presence, in France, of a museum exhibiting West African ritual objects drawn from a private collection quite rightly raises ethical and political questions. This is even more pertinent since part of the collection’s origin lies in a passion for hunting. Mr. Arbogast’s travels must be situated within a colonial legacy in which hunting carried a strong social and symbolic dimension. Safaris, organized under the supervision of professional guides, were considered “responsible” by the standards of the time and perpetuated an imaginary of exploration and prestige inspired by prominent figures such as Roosevelt and Hemingway. African elites also appropriated this practice as a marker of social distinction, and in some instances offered hunts as gifts to reward services rendered.
On an institutional level, wildlife was regarded as a resource to be managed according to principles deemed “scientific,” modelled on Western conservation standards, even if hunting regulations remained weak in many rural areas. International hunting organizations at times raised alarms about overhunting and poaching and even provided financial support for the establishment of reserves. Today, “legal” hunting remains the subject of considerable debate. The Arbogast collection must be understood within this specific socio-historical context. To evoke it is neither to judge nor to justify, but to explain how such collections came into being.

In summary, the collection’s sources are multiple: the recovery of ritual objects destined to disappear during the years of Christianization; purchases or donations obtained directly from practitioners; acquisitions from other collectors or European galleries; and, since the museum’s foundation, donations from descendants of adepts seeking to safeguard this heritage.

At present, as a private museum managed by an association, we wish to underscore the considerable complexity of establishing with certainty the provenance of each of the 1,500 pieces in the collection. Provenance research is arduous and costly (involving travel expenses, interviews with specialists, transcription time, archival consultation), and every field investigation is specific in nature: working on Vodou objects is not comparable to identifying Berber jewelry, decoding Malagasy funerary rites, or studying Dogon masks from Mali.

The very concept of provenance research gained prominence after the Second World War, in connection with works looted by the Nazis; however it was above all after 2018, with the publication of the Sarr-Savoy report (a study commissioned by the French state recommending the restitution of cultural property acquired without consent during the colonial period), that the matter assumed spectacular importance. Since then, numerous museums in Europe have established dedicated provenance research units. Their work involves ethical, historical, and political stakes and is not confined solely to restitution: it often results in a more nuanced understanding of the context of acquisition, or in forms of collaboration and shared mediation between museums and communities.
It must also be acknowledged that the history of an object cannot always be reconstructed. The creators may no longer be alive, and their descendants may have lost the thread of oral transmission. Furthermore, knowledge of an object’s precise place of origin is often required to reconstruct its story: population movements or the disappearance of certain villages have made it impossible, in many cases, to know everything.
Even though objects are at times “mute” regarding their provenance, we consider it essential not to confine ourselves to purely aesthetic descriptions. This is the reason why we strive to explain their significance within the collection and to provide contextualization. Our inventory has been an invaluable tool in this endeavour, and we have continued to enrich it over the past ten years.

A. Beck

D-“Translation is, at best, an echo.”

This quote by the writer George Borrow finds its full resonance within the walls of the Château Vodou. To find the words that might convey a flourishing philosophy and a complex religion is by no means a simple undertaking.
From its earliest days, the museum’s team has been compelled to exercise particular vigilance with respect to the terminologies employed. Indeed, it is no easy task to render into French, German, or English (our principal languages of mediation) a culture born thousands of kilometres away, whose reality is expressed through a multiplicity of languages. The area concerned encompasses more than twenty dialectal varieties, grouped into six to ten Gbe languages (Adja, Fon, Gun, Ewe, Gen/Mina, among others). Moreover, one must recall that historically all of these languages were essentially oral. While some now possess a standardized written form—Fon, for instance, enjoys an official orthography in Benin—the Mina language still retains only a very limited written usage. Therefore, few texts are available for scientific study.

The provenance of objects likewise constitutes a key element in the way we speak of them. If a Vodou deity originates in a Mina-speaking area, it cannot automatically be assimilated with certain divinities found among the Yoruba. The temptation to “synthesize” or “standardize” the pantheon and the practices of the cult is often strong. Yet simplification must never be pursued at the expense of accuracy. The mediator, guide, or lecturer—whatever the title—must always keep this ethic of translation in mind. It follows that a substantial body of knowledge is indispensable in order to speak of Vodoun without distortion, and it is in the name of this sincerity that we sometimes prefer to acknowledge our lack of information when visitors ask a complex question.

Research into Vodoun, as well as the decisions underlying the drafting of our pedagogical materials, is thus at times somewhat arbitrary and inevitably imperfect. These efforts are carried out with the knowledge and expertise available to us at a given moment, and they evolve over time, shaped by our research, our travels, global museum trends, and our collaboration with partners. Certain terms and concepts are refined, others abandoned altogether (to cite a simple example: the terms “fetish” and “ethnic” have been deemed too negatively connoted to remain pertinent within a museum context).

Finally, one must add to this the fact that in Vodoun, “the word is magical.” Words themselves carry power: through them, through ritual gestures and ingredients, objects acquire their efficacy. A mistranslation should never sound like a profanation, a sacrilege, or a diminishment. This is one of the reasons why we so often prefer to have our texts translated internally, by collaborators trained in Vodou matters (and originating from a variety of countries), rather than by external professionals.

Hence, if at times our pronunciations or accents are less than ideal in evoking Vodou vocabulary, we hope that, in the face of these many challenges, you will not judge us too harshly.

A. Beck

III- Different Perspectives

A- The Vodou Is Everywhere. Drowsy, It Never Dies.

The vodous are omnipresent. All these objects speak to us of the daily life of communities for whom spirituality, magic, pantheism, and the ever-present memory of the ancestors govern each moment and shape every action. Everything is ruled by the boundless power of the universe, known as Ashè.

Ambivalent divinities. Vodous may manifest themselves to human beings at any place and at any time. Consequently, it is essential for humans to regulate these phenomena so that they may prove beneficial rather than harmful. They strive to do so by creating symbolic images intended to identify these “spiritual entities,” as well as by establishing specific spaces conducive to invocation: “vodou houses.”
A vodou cannot be an object. Yet, if an object is a tangible representation of a vodou, it is not the vodou itself. Its presence in a specific location is imbued with a mystical energy bestowed upon it—this active component, responsive to human speech, the ashè, is what reveals the presence of the divinity.

A matter of classification. Vodou objects are frequently subject to the mental projections of outside observers. By disregarding the original intention of their creator, one risks a purely speculative gaze. Nonetheless, classifications may, from a scientific perspective, be considered according to the requirements and particular outlooks of the historian, the art historian, the theologian, the anthropologist, the ethnologist, or the archaeologist. An object may thus be categorized as a subject of study, a collectible, or a work of art—worthy of exhibition, destined for storage, or deemed suitable only for destruction. Such diversity of approaches renders the museologist’s task far from straightforward.
Sometimes vodou lies drowsy. These charms and enchantments exist in that invisible elsewhere, whose gates open only upon the performance of the proper magical acts, sacrifices, and utterances. To illustrate this, one might recall Aladdin’s lamp in the tales of The Thousand and One Nights, where the magical force of its Genie, long buried within, reawakens only when Aladdin rubs the lamp. The appropriate magical gesture summoned forth the Genie and his full power.

Objects as witnesses. The primary intention of the “producers” of these objects—assembled as magical composites of diverse materials—was not to elicit aesthetic pleasure, but rather to provoke spiritual emotions and to signify possible interactions with the invisible worlds to which they could provide access.

Their presence within a museum, far removed from their place of origin and detached from their original purpose, obliges us always to bear in mind the reasons for their creation and the cultural and religious foundations from which they emerged. None of the objects in this collection would exist without their original magico-religious functions, nor without the extraordinary creative vitality of the communities who created them.

The original mission of the museum lies beyond religiosity. The very essence of the collection compels us to define and to reveal to our visitors — curious for new aesthetic and cultural knowledge — where the boundary lies between their religious functions — once the expression of profound faith — and their inert presentation within the secular, profane space of the museum.

J.-Y. Anézo

B) The Weight of Return

Debates on the restitution of cultural property nowadays transcend the former binary opposition between colonizers and the colonized. They reveal instead a multiplicity of historical, political, and symbolic stakes. Recent restitutions by France to Benin (2021), by Germany to Nigeria (2022), as well as Greece’s long-standing claims to the Parthenon marbles, illustrate the scope and diversity of the contexts at hand. These debates also raise questions concerning access to heritage, standards of conservation, and even the very definition of the objects to be returned.
The Vodou Museum of Strasbourg, a self-financed, non-profit institution, has not, to date, been the object of restitution requests. Nonetheless, it cannot disregard the tensions and responsibilities inherent in holding an extra-European collection. The objects assembled from the 1970s onwards by Marc and Marie-Luce Arbogast were acquired in varied circumstances (see To collect is to be able to live from one’s past). This diversity precludes any univocal reading, yet calls for rigorous provenance research that goes beyond administrative documentation.

The museum does not claim to provide a definitive answer to the question of restitution. Rather, it offers a space for dialogue, inquiry, and the dissemination of the information available. Restitution is not only about redressing an injustice; it also requires navigating legal, political, and institutional realities that are sometimes far removed from the communities concerned. There exists, moreover, the risk that restituted objects may be reabsorbed into national institutions with limited accessibility, thereby never really returning to their communities of origin—or worse, that they may ultimately enter private collections, withdrawn from all public view.

In the case of vodou objects, these issues are even more complex. Some objects are described as “deactivated,” yet they continue to carry symbolic weight. Across Nigeria, Benin, Togo, and Ghana, perceptions vary: while some scholars consider them desacralized, others maintain that once an object has been vodou, it remains so forever. Added to this is the fear surrounding particularly powerful objects, such as the Oro breastplates or the Egungun, which are dreaded even within their original cultural contexts. Their prolonged stay in Europe has only heightened this apprehension: some communities believe that such objects have lost their potency, while others insist that they could never again be reintegrated into ritual use.

To whom, then, should restitution be made, when voices diverge? How can one arbitrate between competing claims? These objects are not frozen in the past; they engage with living memories and with worldviews that remain vibrantly present. Within this complex terrain, the Vodou Museum embraces its singular position: that of an independent space, open to nuance, to critique, and to alternative narratives. Restitution, in the end, is not limited to physical displacement: it may also mean acknowledging other conceptions of time, memory, and transmission—and remaining available to let those voices be heard.

A. Niemi and A.C. Gonzalez Palacios

C) Living objects? Ethical and perception issues

By their very nature, the objects housed in the Vodou Museum present a particularly distinctive conservation challenge: these are artefacts not only animated, but tailored from living matter in all its diversity, whether of animal or human origin. Bones, skulls, horns, shells, feathers, down, hair, and even eggshells constitute an essential component in the making of Vodou ritual compositions. Furthermore, most of the pieces in the Arbogast collection are characterized by sacrificial deposits which, at first, accumulate upon the objects, before eventually becoming part of them. Over the course of ceremonies, the successive addition of these elements (earth, pigments, oil, cereal porridge, alcohol, animal blood, etc.) renders Vodou ritual artefacts “living” objects—or more precisely, evolving ones. Yet, their transition from a ritual context to a museum environment necessarily brings an end to the constant metamorphosis that defines them. In our storage rooms, as in our exhibitions, the objects are thus frozen in a state that no longer admits any further contributions of matter supposed to nourish them. Their conservation therefore constitutes, from a ritual standpoint, a problem in its on way.

From an ethical perspective, the central role played by sacrifice in the Vodou religion also raises questions. How should one approach the use of animal remains and the blood sacrifices that gave rise to organic deposits? It is not easy to broach the theme of animal sacrifice with visitors from cultures where such practices are no longer commonplace. Yet, upon closer examination, this type of ritual is in fact present in numerous religions, whether in the form of animal offerings, libations of alcohol, offerings of food, incense, candles, or monetary gifts.

The presence of human remains in the collection, too, gives rise to many questions. These differ significantly from animal matter, since they are not the result of offerings—human sacrifice being today foreign to Vodou culture. However, the use of bones in the making of ritual objects remains a common practice, explained especially by the magico-religious potency they are believed to confer upon compositions. Such practices must, however, be situated within their cultural context of origin, one that maintains a very different relationship to death and to the remains of the deceased than that prevailing in the West.

Among these bones, skulls particularly illustrate this divergence. In the Western imagination, skulls are often associated with pejorative connotations and their use is generally taboo (though this has not always been the case). In contrast, in Vodou religious and memorial practices, the use of skulls transcends their material dimension. Removed from the skeletons of ancestors during decollation rituals (literally, the act of tearing off the head from the body), they are then cleaned and adorned with seeds, cowrie shells, and pigments to honour the individuals to whom they once belonged. Within this culture, where death is conceived as the natural continuation of life and as the possibility of spiritual extension rather than a physical annihilation, skulls serve as a means of ensuring the protection and assistance of those who preceded the living, while simultaneously paying homage to them. Displayed upon altars among other objects of strong symbolic charge, they thus affirm the presence of the ancestors in the here and now and constitute a bridge between the corporeal world of the living and the intangible realm of the departed. Far from being objects of morbid voyeurism, the skulls of the Arbogast collection are therefore witnesses to an alternative understanding of the great passage of death.

A. Niemi and M. Mailfert

D) Considering the end of the objects

At a time when cultural institutions are facing multiple demands (climate requirements, economic pressures, social expectations), museum practices are being redefined. The very idea of ‘conservation’, long associated with the physical preservation of objects, is now at odds with the planet’s limitations. The Château Musée Vodou in Strasbourg, an association housed in a heritage building, provides a significant and sometimes contradictory observation point for this current redefinition.

 
Faced with the finite nature of its collection, documentation becomes an essential tool for transmission. The ongoing process of putting the Arbogast collection online aims to extend the life of the objects beyond their physical existence. However, even this digital documentation has an environmental cost. Far from being neutral, digital alternatives, servers and networks have a significant energy impact. The dilemma is therefore not about choosing between physical and digital, but about finding the right balance, based on full knowledge of the facts.

The museum building, a former classified water tower, imposes its own limitations: it is not air-conditioned, difficult to modify, and cannot easily be equipped with the thermal regulation systems required by international protocols. This gap between theoretical recommendations (constant temperature, controlled humidity) and material realities translates into a constant effort to adjust. Nevertheless, despite this difficult architectural context, the museum has strived to adopt environmentally responsible practices: use of low-energy LEDs, natural humidity control, local and circular economy in the design and manufacture of all exhibition supports.

Furthermore, the objects in the collection are made of living or perishable organic materials. These objects, which originate from voodoo material culture, are fragile by nature. Their ‘stabilisation’ often requires treatments that have a high ecological cost. Hence the importance of asking the question of intention: should these objects be preserved as inert witnesses to a past ritual, or should their transformation and disappearance be accompanied by promoting the transmission of the knowledge associated with them? The Château Musée Vodou has chosen the latter option: conservation, without relentless treatments.

The project to make the museum’s reserves available to the public, initiated with a view to transparency and openness, re-examines the boundary between storage space and exhibition space. It turns it into a hybrid space: accessible but vulnerable, visible but limited. It is in this context that the question of the museum’s ecological responsibility arises: the idea is not only to be virtuous in conservation operations, but also to promote a discourse that allows the ecological issue to be fully included in the public debate, on the modest scale of the museum. In 2026, the museum plans to organise educational workshops on the links between museum conservation and ecological issues, focusing, among other things, on the influence of climate on collections and sustainable restoration techniques.

A.C. Gonzalez Palacios and M. Hirica

Conclusion
“Words do not build walls.” Cratinos

More than eleven years ago, Marie-Luce and Marc Arbogast made the deliberate choice to establish a museum rather than a gallery or an exhibition venue. In doing so, they entrusted themselves with the weighty responsibilities inherent to a museological institution. Other models of operation might have been simpler to manage on a daily basis, yet they would not have risen to the stature of Vodou as a heritage of humanity.
Opening a museum was the only sincere and devoted option for the legacy of which they are the custodians. They did so with temerity, audacity, and entirely at their own expense. The museum has brought them no pecuniary gain, and Mr. Arbogast continues to contribute to it in difficult moments. They did so out of passion and out of a profound love for sharing. Safeguarding this heritage and making it accessible to the greatest number through the Vodou Museum represents a monumental gift to present and future generations. Without their willpower and unwavering support, none of this would ever have come to pass, and we wish to extend to them our deepest gratitude—though words cannot suffice.

Our team, moreover, mirrors the very nature of the objects in the Arbogast collection: it is ever evolving. It adapts, grows, and enriches itself over the years, through projects and in response to external circumstances. It is living proof that a museum cannot be a slumbering institution.

The decision to create an exhibition around our storage spaces and the controversies they evoke was, of course, a curatorial choice, but it also imposed itself upon us. First, because we undertook a significant reorganization of our storerooms, using the occasion to refine the inventory of our collection. We devoted more than 800 hours to cleaning, restoring, describing, monitoring, and reinstalling over 1,500 objects. Whether weighing ten grams or thirty kilograms, each found its place in its new location for the months and years to come—our visible storage.

Then, because certain questions — asked by visitors, journalists, or institutional actors on potentially sensitive subjects — gave us the impetus to put in writing our responses, our positions, our hopes, our aspirations, and our limits. This undertaking also offered the team an opportunity to debate, to reflect on the importance of our professions, on our values, our progress, our shortcomings, and our history.

This museum is like an iceberg within an iceberg: the objects on permanent display are but the visible tip compared with the vastness of the collection as a whole. And this multitude of objects pales beside the flow of knowledge we have assembled around Vodoun. Our work is destined to be shared with all—scholars, students, visitors (hence the importance of the online catalogue we are preparing)—though it remains, for now, constrained by financial resources. We therefore hope soon to continue enriching our inventory through fieldwork and to identify little-known objects. It is fundamental for us to continue collaborating with practitioners of the cult (initiates, devotees) as well as with the political institutions of the countries concerned. Equally rewarding is bearing witness to the pride that the illumination of Vodou heritage can inspire in visitors from West Africa.
To identify a Vodou object is no simple task; often, there is no single answer to its materiality. The same holds true for this exhibition: there is no single or simple response, for it emerges from the convergence of different worldviews and multiple temporalities—an ode to the diversity of perspectives and beliefs.

Therefore, as actors within civil society, we shall continue to speak and to share, to prevent walls from dividing us.

A. Beck