FOR AN AFRICAN GRATITUDE

Description

Images in the service of an idea: Albert Kahn (1860-1940) and the father Aupiais (1877-1945). This book traces, with the words and image, the courageous journey of a missionary of the Society of African Missions of Lyon, more broad-minded than his time. The Reverend Francis preaches Aupiais indeed, facing the West full of himself superiority, for a cause then judged by many sulphurous: rehabilitation of black people, the rehabilitation of the way … In 1925, he created at Porto Novo historical-ethnographic journal, “The African Recognition”. Meanwhile he learned ethnology. His journey leads him to cross Albert Kahn, the banker-philanthropist entrusted finance and a mission that allows the father to indulge, sustainable record of daily life and especially local religions through photography and documentary film, experienced as truly “objective”. Thus, Francis Aupiais bring the country (now Benin) images that Levy Bruhl, expert in the field, and the scientific community of the time deem unique. They make us relive today, intact, the emotion of a different look, attentive and open a universe that Aupiais father knew rightly perceive as a full-fledged civilization, enable us to go in walk-in the realities of Dahomey 1930.