74 J. S. Kubary : photographie du chef Pua-pua avec son entourage, Savaii, Samoa. Archives du Museum für Völkerkunde de Hambourg. Avec l’aimable autorisation du Museum für Völkerkunde de Hambourg. E. Neuhaus : portrait de Fai Atanoa, pris en 1896. Archives du Museum für Völkerkunde de Hambourg. Avec l’aimable autorisation du Museum für Völkerkunde de Hambourg. ABOVE: Mask with shoulder cloth. Dan, Liberia. First half of 20th century. Wood, animal fur, great blue turaco feathers (Corythaeola cristata), cotton, beads. H (mask): 22.9 cm. Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Gift of William Siegmann, inv. 2011.70.1. LEFT: Ceremonial axe. Songye, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Wood, iron, copper. Hood Museum of Art, Gift of Claire E. and Dr. Frederick R. Mebel, Class of 1935; inv. 991.48.29012. first time. It focuses on the aesthetic quality of the objects and on the ways in which they reflect notions of masculinity, warriorhood, and the ideal of male beauty in traditional African societies. Because such weapons are so prevalent in Western collections, the exhibition also considers Western notions of masculinity as represented in the collecting practices of the Christian missionaries, colonial administrators, military officers, big-game hunters, and explorers who acquired so many objects of this kind in the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries. Reflecting this history, the weapons are installed in a manner evocative of Victorian colonial displays. The exhibition is not intended to be a broad survey of African weapons but rather a look at the interaction between cultures, with the various examples that it features categorized as either “offensive” or “defensive.” FROM ABOVE Tucson—Archaeology is a terrestrial occupation that is largely conducted at eye level, but Adriel Heisey has a different perspective on the subject. Heisey’s aerial photographs of historic landscapes and archaeological sites in the American Southwest are currently the subject of an exhibition at the Arizona State Museum in Tucson. In a sense, this is nothing new: Soon after the invention of practical photography in the mid 1800s, aerial shots were sought after by archaeologists to survey sites. Done with balloons and, subsequently, a variety of often-odd aircraft, the results could be unpredictable. Heisey uses his hand-built, fixed-wing flying machines to create images that not only are useful to archaeologists and preservation agencies on both sides of the US/Mexico border, but are also strikingly beautiful, well-composed, poetic, and contemplative. From Above features sixty of Heisey’s large-format images and will be on view until September 20, 2014. their objects, and offer a glimpse into his studies over the course of a long career as a scholar and collector. The exhibition was organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, where it will next be shown, and is accompanied by a scholarly catalog. It will also be the subject of an article in the next issue of this magazine. THE ART OF WEAPONS Hanover—The Hood Museum of Art has long had a fine collection of African weapons that has never been on public display. A new exhibition, The Art of Weapons: Selections from the African Collection, features highlights of this diverse group of objects for the RIGHT: Adriel Heisey. Pueblo Room Blocks in Snow, 2001. Photo courtesy of the Arizona State Museum in Tucson.
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