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Star of the Roaring Twenties committed to the resistance, Joséphine Baker was also the incarnation of fraternity with her tribe, as she called it “rainbow”: 12 children, adopted around the world and raised in the Dordogne in its famous Milandes castle.
Brian Bouillon-Baker, 65 years old, Algerian, and Akio Brian Bouillon-Baker, 69, Japanese, are one of the 12 children adopted by Joséphine Baker. “It was the first time, if not the only time, that an artist (…) adopted children from different cultures, religions, skin colors (…) to make a family”, entrusts Akio. Josephine Baker, who grew up in the slums of the black community in the United States, could not have children.
With her fourth husband, the conductor Jo Bouillon, she adopts babies from all over the world during her tours: Colombia, Finland or Ivory Coast. “I had this idea because I saw so much incomprehension between human beings (…) and I was sure that with very small innocent children, they could set an absolute example of brotherhood”, she confided in 1962. At the castle of Milandes (Gironde), she raises ten boys and two girls, and did not hesitate to publicize her tribe “Rainbow”. They have now become actors, tax inspectors or bankers, and live to the four to the corners of the planet.