Read news from:
Austria
SHARE
COPY LINK

TOURISM

Six lesser-known sites that tell the story of Paris’ black history

There's a lot more to Paris landmarks that the Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe - here tour group Entrée to Black Paris share some of the sites that present a less well-known aspect of the capital's history.

Published: 8 March 2021 15:39 CET
Six lesser-known sites that tell the story of Paris' black history
The Carpeaux fountain in Paris. All photos: Entree to Black Paris

Black history in Paris is broad and deep, and visitors to the city who take the time to explore sites that recall this history will leave the French capital with a deeper appreciation of the impact of African diaspora history and culture on the city.

So here are six little-known sites that that extend from the Luxembourg Garden to the Bobino Theatre in Montparnasse.  You should be able to walk the whole itinerary in about an hour.

Memorial to the Abolition of Slavery

Le Cri, L’Ecrit is a large bronze sculpture in the shape of a chain that emerges from the ground on the eastern side of the Luxembourg Garden. 

Installed on May 10th, 2007 in the presence of outgoing president Jacques Chirac and incoming president Nicolas Sarkozy, it marks the 10th of May as the National Day for the Commemoration of the Abolition of Slavery.  A stele honouring the memory of France’s formerly enslaved people stands nearby.

Memorial to Gaston Monnerville

A memorial to Gaston Monnerville, a native of French Guiana, stands just outside the Observatory Gate on the south side of the garden. 

Born in 1858 in Cayenne, Monnerville obtained a law degree at the University of Toulouse.  He rose to prominence first as an attorney and then as a politician.  During his 21+ year tenure as President of the French Senate, he was the second-highest elected official of the French Republic.

The Carpeaux Fountain

Designed by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, the Fontaine de l’Observatoire stands at the southern end of the Jardin des Grands-Explorateurs. 

It presents four women supporting a celestial sphere, with each woman symbolising a continent of the world:  Africa, Europe, Asia, and North America.  The right ankle of the African woman is shackled, and, intriguingly, the North American woman is portrayed stepping on the end of the chain. 

READ ALSO ‘Forgotten treasure’ – the Paris neighbourhood that tourists rarely see

Closerie des Lilas

Standing near the Carpeaux Fountain, the Closerie des Lilas is famous for having been frequented by writers such as Hemingway and Fitzgerald and artists such as Picasso and Cézanne. 

African-American writer James Baldwin used the restaurant as a setting for his novel Giovanni’s Room, where his protagonist, David, goes to have a drink when he learns that his fiancée is about to return to Paris. 

Jean Zay Elementary School

In 2018-2019, students from Jean Zay Elementary School engaged in a series of monthly video conferences with students from Nature’s Way Montessori School in Knoxville, Tennessee around the life and art of African-American expatriate Beauford Delaney. 

Delaney, who was born in Knoxville in 1901, moved to Paris in 1953 and lived in the vicinity of the Jean Zay School during the 1960s and 1970s.  The French government and the Centre Pompidou own several of his works.

Bobino Theatre

It was here that African-American music-hall star Josephine Baker gave her last performance in 1975. 

Baker was enjoying a successful comeback when she suffered a stroke in her bed after a show.  She was taken to the nearby hospital Pitié-Salpétière, where she died the following day. 

Her funeral procession passed in front of the Bobino before making its way to the Madeleine church, where the funeral was held.

READ ALSO Five of the best off-the-beaten track museums in Paris   

These are just some of the sites on travel company Entrée to Black Paris’s walking tour – a tour that has now developed into a live virtual tour that can be enjoyed online while Covid-related health and travel restrictions are in place.

You can find out more HERE or by emailing [email protected]

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.
For members

TRAVEL NEWS

Why are fewer British tourists visiting Spain this year?

Almost 800,000 fewer UK holidaymakers have visited Spain in 2023 when compared to 2019. What’s behind this big drop?

Published: 23 August 2023 11:36 CEST
Updated: 26 August 2023 18:32 CEST
Why are fewer British tourists visiting Spain this year?

Spain welcomed 12.2 million UK tourists between January and July 2023, 6 percent less when compared to the same period in 2019, according to data released on Monday by Spanish tourism association Turespaña.

This represents a decrease of 793,260 British holidaymakers for Spain so far this year.

Conversely, the number of Italian (+8 percent), Irish (+15.3 percent), Portuguese (+24.8 percent), Dutch (+4 percent) and French tourists (+5 percent) visiting España in 2023 are all above the rates in 2019, the last pre-pandemic year. 

German holidaymakers are together with their British counterparts the two main nationalities showing less interest in coming to Spanish shores.

Britons still represent the biggest tourist group that comes to Spain, but it’s undergoing a slump, with another recent study by Caixabank Research suggesting numbers fell particularly in June 2023 (-12.5 percent of the usual rate). 

READ ALSO: Spain fully booked for summer despite most expensive holiday prices ever

So are some Britons falling out of love with Spain? Are there clear reasons why a holiday on the Spanish coast is on fewer British holiday itineraries?

According to Caixabank Research’s report, the main reasons are “the poor macroeconomic performance of the United Kingdom, the sharp rise in rates and the weakness of the pound”.

This is evidenced in the results of a survey by British market research company Savanta, which found that one in six Britons are not going on a summer holiday this year due to the UK’s cost-of-living crisis.

Practically everything, everywhere has become more expensive, and that includes holidays in Spain: hotel stays are up 44 percent, eating out is 13 percent pricier, and flights are 40 percent more on average. 

READ ALSO: How much more expensive is it to holiday in Spain this summer?

Caixabank stressed that another reason for the drop in British holidaymakers heading to Spain is that those who can afford a holiday abroad are choosing “more competitive markets” such as Turkey, Greece and Portugal. 

And there’s no doubt that the insufferably hot summer that Spain is having, with four heatwaves so far, has also dissuaded many holidaymakers from Blighty from overcooking in the Spanish sun. 

With headlines such as “This area of Spain could become too hot for tourists” or “tourists say it’s too hot to see any sights” featuring in the UK press, budding British holidaymakers are all too aware of the suffocating weather conditions Spain and other Mediterranean countries are enduring. 

Other UK outlets have urged travellers to try out the cooler Spanish north rather than the usual piping hot Costa Blanca and Costa del Sol destinations.

Another UK poll by InsureandGo found that 71 percent of the 2,000+ British respondents thought that parts of Europe such as Spain, Greece and Turkey will be too hot to visit over summer by 2027.

There’s further concern that the introduction in 2024 of the new (and delayed) ETIAS visa for non-EU visitors, which of course now also applies to UK nationals, could further compel British tourists to choose countries to holiday in rather than Spain.

READ MORE: Will British tourists need to pay for a visa waiver to enter Spain?

However, a drop in the number of British holidaymakers may not be all that bad for Spain, even though they did spend over €17 billion on their Spanish vacations in 2022. 

Towns, cities and islands across the country have been grappling with the problem of overtourism and the consequences it has on everything from quality of life for locals to rent prices. 

READ ALSO: ‘Beach closed’ – Fake signs put up in Spain’s Mallorca to dissuade tourists

The overcrowded nature of Spain’s beaches and most beautiful holiday hotspots appears to be one of the reasons why Germans are visiting Spain in far fewer numbers. A recent report in the country’s most read magazine Stern asked “if the dream is over” in their beloved Mallorca.

Spanish authorities are also seeking to overhaul the cheaper holiday package-driven model that dominates many resorts, which includes moving away from the boozy antics of young British and other European revellers.

Fewer tourists who spend more are what Spain is theoretically now looking for, and the rise in American, Japanese and European tourists other than Brits signify less of a dependence on the British market, one which tends to maintain the country’s tourism status quo for better or for worse.

SHOW COMMENTS