Red paint dripping from statues in public spaces. This is what happened in Brussels to the statue of Leopold II on horseback, the bust of General Storms, the statue of slaves on the run being chased by dogs, and other monuments. The images published in the media are a reminder of the atrocities committed during the colonial era and reflect the current anti-racist sentiment. Surprisingly, colonial architecture has been spared this iconoclasm. What’s more, Brussels is keen to showcase its Art Nouveau heritage. Recently, the Hôtel Van Eetvelde, designed by Victor Horta in 1895, was opened to the public with great fanfare.

The promotion of architectural heritage remains on the agenda, as if architecture could be dissociated from its colonial past. Thus, the Solvay Hotel, designed by Victor Horta in 1894, served as a textbook example for Geert Bekaert to illustrate the architecture of the commonplace. The argument was that, beyond the pomp and circumstance, it was a space that provided shelter and satisfied other deeply human desires… as long as one disregarded the representative function of the dwelling in the context of the colonial commercial practices of the owner.