I experienced an event of a lifetime as I attended the African Art exhibit at the High Museum of Art. My first time enjoying the view within a museum went extremely well. I chose to participate in the African Art exhibit because I was interested in the great artifacts that were preserved from before the nineteenth century and shared with today’s society. If anyone was to ask me what museum exhibit do I recommend them to participate in, I would choose the High Museum of Art’s African Art exhibit. The African Art exhibit is located on the lower level of the museum. The hall was extremely quiet, only hearing whispers as people interacted with the people they arrived with. There were three other groups viewing this exhibit besides my partner and …show more content…
The artwork that is displayed embraced fertility, family, and death. Most of the artwork was hand carved from wood. Viewing the art pieces of the African Art is unmistakable evidence of how many different African cultures interconnect with the themes of the never-ending cycle of life. There is an art piece that is found in this exhibit that is named “Female Figure”. It is derived from the Bamana region of Mali, West Africa. This sculpture piece is made of iron. It represents the importance of women as it is molded to form an upright seated posture. “Mother and Child Figure” is an art piece that derives from the Yombe region of the Republic of the Congo. This piece represents the importance of a woman as it protects the treatment of fertility. This sculpture is made of wood, brass tacks, and glass. Art pieces like “Reliquary Guardian” of the Obamba region and “Reliquary Guardian” of the Gabon are both made of wood and brass. Even from different regions, both sculptures have similar meanings. The “Reliquary Guardian” of the Obamba region represents a family’s ancestral honoring. The “Reliquary Guardian” from the Gabon region was created to protect a bark box with ancestral relics inside. In both faces of each sculpture, you can see how much they have sacrificed and endured for their families. These sculptures tell a story in their …show more content…
This exhibit encounter successfully held my attention as I spent three hours admiring the artists’ works of art. Although the purpose of the exhibit is to depict the life cycle of the different African cultures, I saw another message. I saw how important the female is to these African communities. Many of the sculptures were created using female figures. There is a sculpture in this exhibit that caught my eye. The “Veranda Post” from the Yoruba region of Nigeria depicts the mutual support among men and women of the society. This shows me that no woman is treated less than any man, but as equals. Viewing the many art pieces of the African culture, it is evident that each artist put a lot of hard work and dedication into their masterpieces. From hand carving from wood and using hard to find materials like iron gives each piece of art its own special
When that room is entered all voices are hushed, and all merriment silenced. The place is as holy as a church. In the centre of the canvas is the Virgin Mother with a young, almost girlish face or surpassing loveliness. In her eyes affection and wonder are blended, and the features and the figure are the most spiritual and beautiful in the world's art.
Contextual Theory: This painting depicts a portrait of life during the late 1800’s. The women’s clothing and hair style represent that era. Gorgeous landscape and a leisurely moment are captured by the artist in this work of
Once again the theme of support, unity, and strength is further represented in the artist choice of mass and volume. Even though the piece of art shows two individual figures, the sculpture is made out of one solid black sandstone. This lets the sculpture appear more robust and compact, signs of strength. However, when observing the relief sculpture in profile it appears that the Queen is slightly tilted back and held up by the sandstone itself which adds a notion of support to the view’s perspective.
The display of Benin art in museum and galleries reflect the attitudes and perceptions of Europeans towards non-western artefacts, especially African. Thus as European attitudes change towards non-western art since the discovery of Benin art in 1897, Benin art has been revaluated and re-categorised.
Spending time looking at art is a way of trying to get into an artists’ mind and understand what he is trying to tell you through his work. The feeling is rewarding in two distinctive ways; one notices the differences in the style of painting and the common features that dominate the art world. When comparing the two paintings, The Kneeling Woman by Fernand Leger and Two Women on a Wharf by Willem de Kooning, one can see the similarities and differences in the subjects of the paintings, the use of colors, and the layout
My friends, after traveling through the Asian continent and Japan, I continued on to the Americas. The art in the Americas has three regions, North America, Central America, and South America. Each region has a very distinct aspect to their forms of art. All cultures have some kind of art. Being curious about art, I have collected samples from five different areas. The following works of art are very different from European art, but there are still some similarities. The similarities of the human spirit are evident in the following images.
In the sculpture Seated Bench Figure, a figurine sitting with a small, childlike figure situated on its lap is presented. Created during the Formative Period in the Olmec culture, the statue stands at just under five inches tall and three inches wide, eliciting intimacy between the viewer and figurine. More so, Seated Bench Figure allows the viewer to consider that both figures are important in Olmec culture because of both figures’ relaxed stances and the utilization of a precious green stone. The stone that Seated Bench Figure is made out of, serpentine was regarded as a precious, divine media within Olmec culture. Additionally, resting stances in figurative Olmec aesthetic tradition indicate respected, elite, and potentially godly individuals. The seated stance of the larger figure on a bench, supporting the infant-like form, indicates both...
Western attitudes to African people and culture have always affected how their art was appreciated and this has also coloured the response to the art from Benin.
The museum focused more on the experience of the African slaves in the Americas than anything else, but there was some key information on how they travelled to the New World and the conditions they faced. The use of videos and displays was much more prevalent in this area. This is likely due to the fact that this was the main area of the museum. The museum used videos (see Figure 2) to inspire emotive feelings amongst visitors – one video was of a woman describing the punishment and attempted escape of a friend, whilst the other was a detailed, wordless video of slaves being transported aboard a slave ship to the Americas. The second video was on two curved screens spanning three hundred and sixty degrees and with surround sound, fully engaging the visitor in the experience. This was a clever use of video and sound in order to arouse a moving response from the visitor as they began to feel the reality of a slave’s journey to the Americas. The museum also used comprehensive models of plantations (see Figure 3) and slave ships (Figure 4) to allow the visitor to interact with the slave’s experience travelling to and working in the Americas. Interactive displays were again used in exhibitions discussing where the African slaves come from and were taken to work in and what colonies European states held in Africa (see Figure
A common aspect of African culture is our mediating of deities, ancestors, and spirits, by performing rituals and contacting ancestors or historical ideals. This spiritual combination creates a non-Western idea of movement in art. I enjoy this part of our culture, where we create a less static environment. We become other beings, through our usage of art, dance, and costume with mask and headwear. Our artistic creators are forgotten. Our original artwork are eventually forgotten. The work goes back to the Earth, for the only true matter is how the spirits are manifested in the objects at the current time; eventually even this wears out. At the time of the spiritual manifestation in the objects, they are some of the most powerful aspects in our society.
The narratives in the work speak to the racial and social inequalities in America in the nineties. This deep concern with the coloured experience and the struggle for civil rights is seen in the images and sculptures she creates. Especially of women, as she lived through a time of widespread segregation, so her work was created from the place she knew most intimately.
Kasfir, S. L. (2007) African Art and the Colonial Encounter: Inventing a Global Commodity, Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
I have chosen to describe the artwork Song of the Picks by Gerard Sekoto. I will look at what defines a work as modern and discuss Sekoto's background to fully understand his work and to prove whether it is modern. Several people influenced, supported and encouraged Sekoto and I will briefly discuss them. I will give a brief history of European modernity and its influence on Africa in order to understand African modernity.
The women in art history have used their passions to bring about a necessary change and bring women out of the shadows to which she has been pushed into over the centuries. Making painting their own they bring a new life and expression into the female personalities portrayed that men are not yet able to achieve. Showing the world where they stand and what they are willing to go through shows the strength in character a woman really has and that she is not the equivalent of a bowl of fruit or a vase of flowers in a man’s painting but so much more. These women are an inspiration because even though they lived in a society that thought them week and incapable they proved their strength and determination.
SKIDMORE, E. 1995, the world of spirits and ancestors in the art of western sub-Saharan Africa, Texas Tech University press, Texas, p30-33