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their collections. Although provenance is not the
main subject of the exhibition, we have stated who
conveyed each work to each museum and when.
Often, the histories of objects are more complicated
than lists of previous owners can convey. For
objects with fraught histories, such as works of art
from Benin, we have addressed the topic in the object
labels, in the catalog, and in the audio guide so
that viewers can learn more about this dimension
of the objects’ pasts.
The most important message of the exhibition,
however, addresses the present and is particularly
opportune at a time when nationalist populism
increasingly shapes public discourse. The objects
on display and their deep entanglement with each
other as the products of thought, belief, and extraordinary
creativity are a stark reminder that far
more unites human beings across time and space
than divides us.
Unvergleichlich: Kunst aus Afrika im Bode-Museum
Through spring 2019
Bode Museum, Berlin
smb.museum/en/museums-institutions/bode-museum/
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The exhibition Beyond Compare was curated by the author
of this article, Jonathan Fine, curator for the collections
from West Africa, Cameroon, Gabon, and Namibia in
the Ethnologisches Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
– Preußischer Kulturbesitz, in collaboration with Julien
Chapuis, deputy director of the Bode Museum; Paola
Ivanov, curator for East, Central, and Southern Africa; and
three young scholars, Antje Akkermann, Andrew Sears, and
Christine Seidel.
NOTES
1. See Julien Chapuis, Jonathan Fine, and Paola Ivanov, Introduction
to Beyond Compare: Art from Africa in the Bode
Museum (Berlin: Edition Braus GmbH, 2017), pp. 11–13.
2. See Rajagopalan Radhakrishnan, “Why Compare?” New
Literary History, vol. 40, No. 3 (2009), pp. 453–71.
3. Chapuis, et al., Beyond Compare, p. 11.
4. Ibid., p. 17.