The legacy of Leopold II, the second king of Belgium, has a controversial character. A recent report by the UN questions the symbolism of 19th century statues and monuments in the public space and links it to the colonial atrocities in Congo. The heroic representation of prominent national figures is a far cry from the role they played in reality. As symptoms of the ‘construction’ of a national identity they are merely the tip of the iceberg. The king was a prolific master builder and laid the basis for expansive infrastructural, urbanistic and architectural projects that can be regarded as part of our national patrimony. Realised with the blood money of the colony, they can however also be labelled as contentious heritage.

After investigating some of these grands projects, the students focused on the Royal Museum for Art and History in Brussels. The assignment was to develop architectural and programmatic strategies to transform it into a contemporary museum, to redefine some of the underused spaces and give it, together with adjacent buildings or gardens more appeal to a broader audience. Rather than emulate the monumental and archaic structure they were to define surgical transformations and develop a critical point of view on the future role of the museum and the contentious aspects of its memory.