ART on view
AFRICA: Religions of Ecstasy
Exhibiting the Experience to Understand It
70
On May 18, the Musée d’Ethnographie
de Genève (MEG) inaugurated a new temporary
exhibition which, for the fi rst time since the museum’s
reopening in October of 2014, focused
on the African continent. Conceived of by the
MEG’s director Boris Wastiau and titled Afrique.
Les religions de l’extase (Africa: The Religions
of Ecstasy), this exhibition examines religious
convictions that are spiritually rooted and enable
believers to enter into communion with divine
forces. The installation presents nearly 400
objects—examples of material culture drawn
from the museum’s collection, photographs, and
in situ documentary fi lms, as well as visual creations
by contemporary artists—all testifying to
the richness and omnipresence of African religious
practices.
A few weeks before the exhibition opened to
the public, we had the pleasure of visiting with
Boris Wastiau as the installation was being set
up, and he shared some perspectives with us.
Interview by Elena Martínez-Jacquet
Tribal Art Magazine: Discussing religion in the
twenty-fi rst century can be a delicate business, and
the subject can provoke reactions that range from
indifference to the most extreme devotion. What
made you decide to explore this subject and to do
so in the context of Africa?
Boris Wastiau: I have been interested in
religious practices in Africa for a very long
time, and I even did my doctoral research
on possession rites among the Luvale of
Zambia and Angola. The complexity of the
phenomenon of religion and its omnipresence
in the daily lives of the people of Africa is
remarkable, but it remains a little-known
subject in the West. I’ve taught courses on the
anthropology of religion with an emphasis on
Africa in the History of Religions department
at the University of Geneva since 2015. At the
fi rst class meetings, I’ve made a habit of asking
the students to give me the name of a single
African religion, and I am met with silence
FIG. 1 (above):
Group of crosses.
Amhara, central highlands,
Ethiopia.
19th–20th century.
Silver, bronze, wood, leather.
MEG collection.
© MEG, J. Watts.