Anthropos: Anthropos, 92.1997,1/3

Anthropos, 92.1997,1/3

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Zeitschrift

Strukturtyp:: Zeitschrift

Werks-URN (URL):: https://digi.evifa.de/viewer/resolver?urn=urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-714820

URN:: urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-714820

Persistenter Identifier:: BV043334262

Titel:: Anthropos

Erscheinungsort:: Fribourg

Verlag:: Ed. St. Paul

Erscheinungsjahr:: 1906

Sammlung:: Zeitschriften und Zeitungen > Zeitschriften zur Ethnologie

Wissensgebiet:: Sozial- und Kulturanthropologie > Allgemeines

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Strukturtyp:: Zeitschriftenband

Werks-URN (URL):: https://digi.evifa.de/viewer/resolver?urn=urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-711886

URN:: urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-711886

Persistenter Identifier:: 1513768301723

Titel:: Anthropos, 92.1997,1/3

Erscheinungsjahr:: 1997

Signatur:: LA 1118

Sammlung:: Zeitschriften und Zeitungen > Zeitschriften zur Ethnologie

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Strukturtyp:: Zeitschriftenheft

Titel:: Bd. 92, 1997, Heft 1-3

Sammlung:: Zeitschriften und Zeitungen > Zeitschriften zur Ethnologie

Zeitschriftenartikel

Strukturtyp:: Zeitschriftenartikel

Titel:: Promoting African Art. The Catalogue to the Exhibit of African Art at the Royal Academy of Arts, London

Sonstige Person:: Beidelman, T. O.

Sammlung:: Zeitschriften und Zeitungen > Zeitschriften zur Ethnologie

4 T. O. Beidelman Anthropos 92.1997 which is smaller and constructed as a continuous circular ramp with occasional adjoining, level gal leries. The Guggenheim show is smaller, about 550 objects. Jay Levenson of the Guggenheim asserts that “it will be essentially the same show” (Vincent 1996: 122), but an exhibit reduced by 34% is seriously altered. The Guggenheim has published a smaller, supplementary catalogue showing far less pieces but including newly shown objects (and associated discussions) not in the London or Berlin exhibits and hence not in this catalogue under review here. Neither the Royal Academy catalogue nor the Guggenheim supplement accu rately conveys the actual impression of the exhibits since the catalogue illustrations are detailed and large whereas the exhibits were criticized for their poor display and labelling of many objects (Sie- ber 1996:70; Ross 1996:6 for London; my own judgment for New York). The Catalogue This sumptuous catalogue contains three brief in troductions, an essay of Africa’s archaeological re cord, and seven self-contained sections, each based on a geographical region of Africa and prefaced by a coloured map indicating the societies whose works are shown. Each section opens with one or more essays by experts in that area who introduce the cultures and works which follow. All of the objects in the exhibit (and some not shown) are attractively illustrated in colour, sometimes with more than one photograph. Each is accompanied by terse but often informative remarks by a scholar along with citation of the provenance of the piece (where this is known), indication of where it has previously been exhibited, and a few scholarly references pertaining to the work or the culture which produced it. These commentaries involve a wide range of scholars (126 in all), some more qualified than others, not just the authors of the sectional introductions. At the end of the catalogue there is a huge bibliography, nearly 1400 items. The three brief introductory essays are by Tom Phillips (an artist and the organizing curator of the exhibit), Kwame Anthony Appiah, the African phi losopher and murder mystery writer who teaches at Harvard University, and his friend Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the Black American literary scholar and critic who also teaches at Harvard. There is also a brief essay on the African “prehistoric” record by Peter Garlake, the British archaeologist and histo rian of Africa. Ironically, none of these authors is an expert on African art. The most interesting of these essays is Appiah’s which questions both the concept of Africa and of art, issues to which I shall return in the second part of this review article. The seven cultural-geographic sections to the catalogue (and exhibit) are: (1) ancient Egypt (introduced by Edna R. Russmann) and Nubia (introduced by Lâslo Tordk), (2) eastern Africa (introduced by John Mack), (3) southern Africa (introduced by Patricia Davison), (4) central Africa (introduced by Daniel Biebuyck and Frank Herre- man), (5) western Africa and the Guinea coast (introduced by John Picton), (6) the sahel and sa vannah of western Africa (introduced by René A. Bravmann), and northern Africa, including Mus lim and Coptic Egypt (introduced by Timothy A. Insoll, M. Rachel MacLean, R.J.A. Wilson, Nadia Erzini, and Rachel Ward). The catalogue (and exhibit) departs from other such surveys of African art in two respects. First, it attempts to give more balanced coverage to all regions of Africa whereas in previous surveys eastern and southern Africa receive far less or even no coverage. Second, it includes ancient Egypt and Nubia and Muslim/Berber/Carthaginian/Cop tic northern Africa (Roman and Greek colonial material is excluded). Even so, those areas of sub-Saharan Africa which have traditionally dom inated the study of African art, namely western and central Africa, continue to dominate here. In contrast, the Egyptian and north African materials which have each usually constituted their own special and celebrated art worlds to scholars and experts are not here given attention comparable to the sheer scope and general acknowledgement of their achievements. Despite their inclusion, this catalogue (and exhibit) remains mainly a statement about sub-Saharan African cultures and the reasons for this, while never fully stated, seem clear and important, though debatable. The complex reasons for these combinations and imbalances are essentially political, and I dis cuss them in the latter half of this essay where I consider the catalogue and exhibit as sociological and cultural events in themselves. At this point, at my describing the catalogue, I simply indicate the numbers of artefacts representing each of the seven cultural-geographic areas. 834 objects are illustrated: ancient Egypt and Nubia, 103; eastern Africa including Ethiopia, 91; southern Africa, 94; central Africa, 141; western Africa and the Guinea coast, 227; the sahel and savannah of western Africa, 94; and northern Africa, 94. Finally, while I do not want to present a lita ny of minor technical criticisms about errors and omissions in the text of a catalogue of this size

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