Arts of Africa "Digital Intervention"

The existence of African art within Western museums should always be looked at critically. Considering how art is often the first point of reference to other cultures and experiences; the presence, absence, and contextualization of African art is indicative of how Africans are situated and perceived in Western contexts. Although African art sits at the helm of contemporary art movements, the knowledge of a "typical" Western museum visitor is still very limited when it comes to understanding African art. Prominent contemporary art figures that emerged from the School of Paris (French and émigré artists who worked in Paris for the first half of the 20th Century), such as Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso directly cite the influence of "tribal" and "primitive" African aesthetics in their own practice that led to the revolution of European painting and sculpture and birth of the early 20th Century avant-garde art movement. Prior to this modernist shift, African art did not attract a global appreciation and contemplation but were rather used for ethnographic study or to demonstrate colonial conquest.

Despite its undeniable influence, African art still remains largely inaccessible to Western audiences as it does not conform to universally regarded classical European and American painting and sculpture. African art was labeled as "primitive" and African artists were considered skilled craftsman before they were considered artists. The nuance is subtle, but where the former implies a mastery of the technical, the latter is an acknowledgement of individual consciousness and the drive to decipher the world around you through art practice. As you scroll through this story map, you will encounter five different African artworks from Central and West African from the Smith College Museum of Art (SCMA) collection. I have chosen these pieces as they engage with the theme of: Womanhood and Femininity. From here, there are a series of “digital interventions” where American contemporary artworks respond to the theme and the African pieces in complementary ways. The significance of these interventions is to highlight the dynamism of African thought and aesthetics that existed outside of Western traditions and how, Africans were actively engaging with universal human concepts that moved past the confining labels of contemporary and traditional/primitive art.

Theme: Womanhood and Femininity

Nationality: American.

The SCMA is an American institution with a pre-dominantly American audience, thereby American works of art are used to demonstrate how American artists specifically are unknowingly and sometimes knowingly creating a visual dialogue with these 19th/early 20th Century African works of art.

Time: Contemporary pieces (artworks made from the 1960s onwards)

The intervention pieces (with the exception of two) are contemporary works of art that emerge from a specific time period - made post 1960s. The African pieces have a similarly large breadth of creation dates, ranging from the beginning of the 19th century to the mid 20th century. The use of American pieces that chronologically follow the African pieces situates Africa within an un-ignorable past and creates an art historical thread that stretches across time and place.

“… The museum may be one of the greatest catalysts of human empathy and compassion.” – Dacher Keltner (Professor of Psychology at UC Berkley.)

This project emerges as a way to give people access to African works of art removed from their original context but still worthy of awe and empathy. The transgression of the traditional paternalistic gaze and commentary on African art will enable people to perceive and understand African art as art, and something that holds more than just historical or ethnographic value.

Dacher Keltner, a professor of Psychology at UC Berkley, speaks extensively about the museum as a site for social connection and understanding. Empathy is defined as the “capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference”. Similar to empathy, sympathy is also an emotion that prompts connection but whilst sympathy is the act of sharing – particularly in the temporary sense, empathy is the act of understanding and thus deeper human bonding.

Within the context of the museum, empathy is an infallible tool that is necessary when curating and collecting works from outside the institution’s location/background. It is not enough for museums to mass collect works from other cultures, but they must be specific about how said works connect to their collection and how they can successfully approach and spark empathy in the first-time museum visitor. And so the practice of radical empathy for African art is long overdue.

Historically, throughout Africa, most masks are made and performed by men, including those representing female characters or expressing ideas about womanhood.

Okuyi or Mukudj masks are similarly idealized, although they are considered portraits of specific women admired for their beauty among Punu and other communities in Southern Gabon. Whitening the surface of the mask with mpembe, a type of clay associated with the ancestral realm, transforms the earthly subject into a spiritual entity. The mask would be worn by a male dancer on tall stilts, his body covered with layers of raffia or cloth. When performed, the dancer’s acrobatic movements contrast with the characteristically serene expression of the mask.

Pwo masks [seen above] have been created to pay tribute to founding female ancestors among Chokwe, Songo and neighbouring societies since at least the 19th century. Such masks visualize cultural ideals of female beauty, reflected here in the sensitively rendered facial features and depiction of body modifications such as scarification marks and filed teeth. Performed by men wearing full body costumes, Pwo masks model feminine ideals for their audiences and women, in turn, may critique the accuracy of these representations.

 Nothing can be studied in a vacuum, and although there is a need to study the particular in Art History, the inter-connectedness of global visual culture is impossible to ignore. It is important for American institutions to pay attention to African art (past and present) especially as the burgeoning conversation about the repatriation of African art unfolds rapidly. Ultimately, we are left with three important questions about the presence and influence of African aesthetics and culture in American art institutions.

 How can American institutions avoid the tokenization of African art and equitably integrate these works into their collection? How can American institutions hold themselves accountable in the discussions about repatriation that could potentially put at risk national history museums, art institutions, galleries etc? And What are collecting practices that need to be created and implemented when it comes to seeking African art?

Biro, Y. (2012). African arts between curios, antiquities and avant-garde at the Maison Brummer, Paris (1908-1914).

(2018, January). Dacher Keltner: The Art of Emotions/Emotions in Art: From the Pixar Film to the Empathetic Museum [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odtAJ2kPdqc

"Arts of Africa" Exhibition Labels provided and written by Dr. Christa Clarke