ART ON VIEW
I believe that formal perfection (not to be confused
with aesthetics, which is a question of taste) is an intrinsic
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quality in any work of art and is the result of
conscious choices made by its creator. Thus it always
exists, even independently of the user or even the artist’s
ability or inability to express it in verbal terms,
because form and the organization of form are the
language of the fi gurative art of all times. This consideration
ought to be applicable to artists the world
over, but the creations of the artists of Africa—those
that live south of the Sahara—had to wait until after
the Second World War to have their artistic value
affi rmed, to be freed of their ethnographic context,
and to be allowed to accede to the universe of just
art, like all other artistic manifestations. When that
fi nally happened, it resulted in a great enrichment of
the cultural patrimony of all of humanity.
Nearly ninety objects of high formal and aesthetic
quality from major private collections and
European museums represent the arts of Central
Africa in this fi rst section. Elio Revera edited the
essay on this section of the exhibition and added
an insert about historical context, rituals, and symbolic
meanings to the description of each piece,
providing valuable information that the visual appreciation
of a work alone cannot convey.
The second part of the show examines a subject
that is currently being much researched, namely
that of the recognition of “Master Hands.” African
art objects of all kinds have generally been considered
anonymous, and their paternity was rarely
assigned to a defi ned artistic identity. In truth,
however, thanks in part to studies that have been
conducted since the beginning of the twentieth
century, leading Africanists recognize not only that
specifi c artists can be identifi ed, but that organized
ateliers or workshops can be as well. The most
striking case remains that of the Buli Master, an
appellation long carried by convention, who was
the fi rst of these artists to have been recognized and
identifi ed, thanks to the work of Frans Olbrechts.
African artists thus become more than just silent
fi gures; they have status as defi ned individuals and
conscious creators, who have given their sculptures
precise and recognizable stylistic elements in
response to the needs of the community in which
they work. Several examples are presented in the
exhibition, thanks to an attentive presentation by
Bernard de Grunne.
The third section of the exhibition, titled
“Mande: 1000 ans d’art malien” (“Mande: 1,000
Years of Malian Art”), is largely about the subject
of time. The study of Western art has accustomed
generations of art historians to attribute and situate
paintings and other works of art chronologically,
often with rigor and accuracy. Commissions,
material and formal characteristics, documentary
proof, and the signatures of artists all help make
it possible to perform this challenging task, which
once completed often leaves only a minimal margin
of error. As we all know, the same criteria cannot
be applied to the dating of African objects, the
histories of which have long been lost. The need
to clarify chronology made itself apparent in the
middle of the twentieth century, even though the
techniques of scientifi c analysis at the time were
not yet comparable to those we have at our disposal
now. Today, stratigraphic excavations together
with stylistic and historical research, as well
as radiocarbon and thermoluminescence analyses,
make it possible to reconstruct absolute and relative
chronologies with considerable accuracy. The
focus in this section is on Mali, and the installation
presents a corpus of wood and terracotta works
that date to the African Middle Ages and were created
by the Soninke and the Dogon.
FIG. 4 (below): Three power
fi gures, minkisi. Songye,
DR Congo. 19th century.
Wood, metal, upholstery tacks, beads,
fi ber, raffi a fabric. H: 14, 14, and
16.5 cm.
Collection ABG.
Photo © Hughes Dubois.
FIG. 5 (top right): Neckrest.
Luba-Shankadi, DR Congo.
Wood. H: 15.5 cm.
Museo di Storia Naturale –
Antropologia e Etnologia, Sistema
Museale di Ateneo, Università degli
Studi di Firenze.
Photo: Saulo Bambi, Sistema Museale
di Ateneo, Università degli Studi di
Firenze.