MUSEUM news 58 LEFT: Meschac Gaba, SS Rotterdam. 2016. Synthetic hair, metal, textile. Reproduced by permission of Lumen Travo Gallery, Amsterdam; Tanya Bonakdar Gallery New York; Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town; In Situ Galerie, Paris. Photo: Krijn van Noordwijk. LEFT: Mask, ndunga. Woyo, DR Congo. Wood, pigment, feathers, fi ber. Wereldmuseum, inv. 28547. Photo: R. Asselberghs, Frédéric Dehaen, Brussels. BELOW CENTER: Gelede helmet mask. Yoruba, Nigeria. Wood, pigments. Wereldmuseum, inv. 73802. Photo: R. Asselberghs, Frédéric Dehaen, Brussels. BELOW: Group of objects from Papua New Guinea illustrating the concepts of the exhibition in Basel about affi nities and differences in non-European art. STAYING IN LINE Basel—An examination of the concepts of singularity and similarity is the focus of a unique thematic exhibition on view at the Museum der Kulturen in Basel until May 28, 2017. Titled Staying in Line: Single Objects in Series, it seeks to show how, whether from Papua New Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire, or India, all works in the field of ethnology are unique insofar as they are the creations of the hand of man, yet they gain interest from being admired side by side with other works of the same type. The consideration of a group of works together can be extremely revealing, insofar as this makes it possible to understand the differences that distinguish each individual piece. Variants illustrate the evolution of styles, the individual characteristics of each artist’s hand, and how certain ritual conventions function. AFRIKA 010 Rotterdam—On view until January 8, 2017, the Wereldmuseum is presenting Afrika 010. One of the exhibition’s main attractions is that it allows an opportunity to see the most important African objects in the museum’s collection, a group of artworks that has not been shown for a very long time. These were on the verge of being sold along with other objects held by other institutions in the same city. The exhibition focuses on Rotterdam collections and examines the history of the connections and cultural exchanges between the Dutch city and the African continent, which have been particularly dynamic in the realm of the arts. The selection of works displayed includes objects from the Lower Congo, photographs, maps, and paintings, all brought to Rotterdam by local merchants at the end of the nineteenth century, soon after the Wereldmuseum’s 1883 opening. It also features donations from the Piet and Ida Sanders Collection as well as a number of other works that the museum has acquired more recently. Afrika 010 concludes with the presentation of an installation by contemporary Beninese artist Meschac Gaba, a resident of Rotterdam, who created a group of wigs made of multicolored braids, clearly infl uenced by the African art of coiffure, the shapes of which evoke the architectural emblems of the city.
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