Attendees fill the KMCC Reel Time theater for the first installment of UMGC’s film festival. The second in the series will be held Feb 5, 2026. (Julie Fischer | UMGC in Europe)
UMGC in Europe is hosting “Dahomey,” the second showing in a film festival titled “Screened History: Global Pasts in Francophone Films,” at the KMC Reel-Time Theater this Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026 at 6:30 p.m.
The documentary explores the return of 26 works of art from the Musée du quai Branly in Paris to the Republic of Benin. Mati Diop, the Franco-Senegalese director, named the documentary after the Kingdom of Dahomey in West Africa, which existed since the 1600s. In 1904, the kingdom fell and became a French colony. The kingdom existed inside the current borders of the Republic of Benin.
The film’s subject is 26 art objects taken to Paris after the Second Franco-Dahomeyan War in 1894. The documentary follows the objects from a Paris museum in November 2021 to arrival at the presidential palace of Benin.
However, the film is not a straightforward documentary. There is something mystical and magical about these statues. The statue of a king has many thoughts echoing across time. The statue prefers if you don’t call it Object Number 26. The film is a documentary and a poetic meditation. Indeed, the poet Makenzy Orcel wrote the words spoken by the king’s statue. The statues are not dead. They speak.
We do not always ask where an object comes from when we gaze at it on a wall or through glass in a museum. Diop asks us to consider art as soulful and aware of its journeys. How does a statue pack for a flight?
The final part of the film documents the reception of these statues in modern Benin. The objects received a red carpet and a homecoming celebration. In these scenes, the director asked university students to reflect on the meaning of art objects returning after over a century in Europe. Past, present, and future mingle in the mystical journey of 26 objects.
All films are offered at no cost; you must have base access. This is a private university event open to the KMC. All films have subtitles in English. A RSVP is requested for the film on the UMGC in Europe Presents webpage.
