ART ON VIEW
chi, the director of the Florence Museum of Anthropology
66
and Ethnology. Although Anti had no
special resources at his disposal that might enable
him to propose a formal and interpretive analysis
of the objects displayed, he had developed a clear
concept for the exhibition, which Mochi succinctly
described as follows: “We have to produce an art
show that lets ethnography show through as little
as possible.”4 For the fi rst time, although restricted
to three “display cases of ten pieces each,”5 thirty
three objects were shown in Italy, twenty-six of
which belonged to the Museum of Ethnography in
Rome and seven to the Florence Museum of Anthropology
and Ethnology. They were presented
as “art objects” and not as the banal repetition of
the display of artifacts considered retrograde and
primitive. This exhibition, audacious in all respects
at the time, was presented before the Galerie Pigalle
show in Paris in 1930 and before the grandiose
African Negro Art show at New York’s Museum
of Modern Art in 1935. Unfortunately, it never received
the type of recognition or achieved the same
success as did those shows. With only a few exceptions,
the Italian press either sabotaged or simply
ignored the exhibition. Nonetheless, this was a truly
innovative event that was quickly forgotten in an
Italy that would be preoccupied by the march on
Rome and the defi nitive advent of fascism only fi ve
months later. Organized by Bassani, this section
represents the fi rst-ever reconstitution of this seminal
display of African art, which was made possible
by his years of study and archival research.
“XXe siècle: l’Europe se penche sur l’Afrique”
(“The Twentieth Century: Europe Focuses on Africa”),
the seventh part of the exhibition, organized
by Micol Forti, examines another crucial topic: the
dialog that was established in the beginning of the
twentieth century between the so-called art Nègre
and the Western artists of the avant-garde. African
masks, with their clean lines, were arriving in Europe
at that time and infl uencing the cubists and
the fauves in Paris, the expressionists in Berlin and
Dresden, and even Modigliani and Carrà in Italy,
to mention but a few. The classicism that had dominated
the previous century was toppled, making
room for new forms. The exhibition presents an
overview of this synergistic connection.
When the art of Dahomey is mentioned, it is often
in reference to its well-known court art that
features in the voyage accounts of explorers and
adventurers. In his Sculpture vaudou Fon du pays
d’origine: un art profondément apotropaïque
(Fon Voodoo Sculpture from Its Country of Origin;
A Profoundly Apotropaic Art), Pierre Amrouche
presents another facet of Dahomeyan art,
its popular one, thanks to the Jacques Kerchache
Collection that was formed in the 1960s. Objects
used for vodun —a term used to designate an exclusively
magic and religious popular art style —
are being featured in this show for the fi rst time
in Italy, exposing viewers
to an aesthetic completely
different from what they
may be accustomed—a
cumulative and sacred art
form that survived Western
infl uence and remains
strongly connected to the
issues and fears faced by
contemporary man.
The story that concludes
the exhibition is told by
Micol Forti in “Art africain
contemporain”
FIG. 7 (above): Hunting
horn. Sierra Leone.
C. 1495–1521.
Elephant ivory. H: 63 cm.
Provenance: Museo di Antichità,
Turin University; formerly in the
Ducal Palace collection.
Reproduced by permission of the
Ministry of Cultural Affairs—Turin,
Royal Museums—Armeria Reale.
Photo © Ernani Orcorte.
FIG. 8 (below): Moffat
Takadiwa, Cross Boarder
Hustlers, 2015.
Remains of recovered cans, plastic
caps, cart, light bulbs. Dimensions
variable: max: 300 x 200 cm + cart: 90
x 80 x 50 cm.
Private collection, Bologna, Italy.