‘Demeaning’ Columbus murals at Notre Dame hard to move, but will be hidden, president says
The University of Notre Dame has decided not to display its controversial 19th Century murals of Christopher Columbus — but the way they were painted makes them tricky to remove.
Luigi Gregori painted scenes from the European explorer’s life directly on the plaster of the school’s Main Building in South Bend, Indiana, between 1882 and 1884, “so any attempt to move them would damage and likely destroy the works,” said John I. Jenkins, president of the school, in a letter to students and faculty on Sunday.
“I have decided … on a course that will preserve the murals, but will not display them regularly in their current location,” Jenkins wrote, explaining that the paintings will “be covered by woven material consistent with the décor of the space, though it will be possible to display the murals on occasion.”
In his letter, Jenkins said the process of making the covers “will begin soon.”
Cities across the United States have been ditching Columbus Day in recent years and honoring indigenous peoples or veterans instead — including Columbus, Ohio, a city named after the increasingly controversial historical figure, McClatchy reported last year.
Statues of Columbus have been taken down across the country as well, NBC Los Angeles reports, much like statues of Confederate generals and soldiers.
Jenkins explained his decision by pointing to criticism of the paintings from students and faculty, who have said the murals are “at best blind to the consequences of Columbus’s voyage for the indigenous peoples who inhabited this ‘new’ world and at worst demeaning toward them,” Jenkins wrote in his letter.
The school hopes the decision will both preserve the historical murals while also respecting Native American communities that were harmed by Columbus’ arrival in the Americas. Jenkins said the murals wrongly suggest Columbus was only a well-meaning explorer and “friend of the native peoples.”
In 2017, hundreds of students, university employees and alumni called on the school to remove the 12 130-year-old murals in a letter published in The Observer, a student-run newspaper.
“According to the University’s own pamphlet, the murals are specifically designed to ‘create a heroic impression’ of someone who owned, traded and sold humans as slaves, as well as someone who initiated one of the largest genocides in human history,” the letter said. “Columbus’ fortune, fame and wealth came from the destruction, mutilation and transaction of Native American and African persons.”
The letter said the dozen murals are the university’s “own version of a Confederate monument.”
Critics of the murals said they were excited to see them covered up.
“This is a good step towards acknowledging the full humanity of those Native people who have come before us,” said Marcus A. Winchester-Jones, president of the Native American Student Association and a junior at Notre Dame, according to the South Bend Tribune. “We sincerely hope that Father Jenkins and his administration will continue to prioritize Native issues on our campus in the coming weeks and months as there is still work to be done.”