MONTREAL — The museum named in honour of Canadian racing legend Gilles Villeneuve is temporarily shutting down amid a legal battle with the late driver’s family over his memorabilia.
The museum’s general manger, Alain Bellehumeur, accused the Villeneuve family of squandering the Formula One driver’s heritage in a statement announcing the closure of the museum in Berthierville, Que., about 70 km northeast of Montreal.
On Thursday, the driver’s widow and two adult children — including former F1 champion Jacques Villeneuve — announced they were taking legal action to recover memorabilia from the museum, citing concerns over the institution’s ability to safeguard the racing star’s legacy.
Melanie Villeneuve told The Canadian Press the theft late last year of a large bronze statue of her father from outside the Gilles Villeneuve museum was the “point of no return” that cemented the family’s loss of confidence in the institution.
“For quite some time we’ve been worried about how his image is being diluted by this use, and I don’t want to be super negative, because I don’t think people did it with the wrong intentions,” she said. “But I think that now we’re ready to maybe turn the page open a new chapter and maybe take ownership of his legacy.”
Villeneuve said the family, including her brother and her mother, Joann, have started a process to recuperate some of her father’s items that are at the museum, which opened in 1988.
The family is seeking items including personal possessions as well as trophies and memorabilia, some dating back to Villeneuve’s early days of racing on Quebec’s snowmobile circuit and the Formula Atlantic league. Villeneuve said all the memorabilia being sought was on loan from the family, and they are not trying to stake a claim to items donated by other parties.
“We’re just going to take back what belongs to us, basically,” she said.
The museum and its lawyers say they offered to keep the memorabilia during the legal proceedings, but that was refused by the family.
Quebec-born Gilles Villeneuve participated in 67 Formula One races from 1977 to 1982, winning six. He died at age 32 in a crash during qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix in 1982.
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