The Brooks Museum celebrated the reopening of its African collection on Saturday.
The collection displays pieces from the south of the Sahara Desert including Central and Western Sudan Central Africa and West Africa. The pieces range from utilitarian items to formal and religious works.
"I'm here for my art class," said Tanique Bougard. "We look for symbolic and visual meaning in different cultural art. It's interesting, but it's hard to understand," she said.
A large portion of the exhibit was loaned by Henry Easterwood, a former Memphis College of Art professor.
The entire African collection is too large for the museum to show at one time.
"We have about 100 African pieces," said John Weeden, the interim Exhibitions Manager. "We are showing 33 total, so we're showing about a third of what we have," he said.
With such a large group of pieces, the museum reconfigures the exhibit every couple of years, said Weeden. This includes repainting, putting together new showcases and deciding what new pieces to present to the public. This work closes a section of the museum to the public for a couple of months which is the reason the museum only reworks the collection every couple of years, he said.
The native art ranges through many groups of peoples such as the Kota, Kuba, Pende, Bwa, Bamana and many others groups. The pieces are presumed to be dated from the 1930s or earlier but dating the work is difficult.
This is because "...many of the objects are collected out of context, away from their site of origin," said Earnestine Jenkins, a University of Memphis professor and curator of the African exhibit. As African art became popular in the last century, artists began producing pieces for consumers as well as for cultural reasons.
"Different specialists such as scholars or museum curators have different ideas about judging African art," said Jenkins. "For some, age or antiquity is a marker of value. However, African artists continue to make traditional art forms for use in their own cultures, as well as making pieces for sale to tourists." Most of the work is constructed of short-lived materials and is remade constantly and dates most pieces to a later period.
Masks made of various sizes and materials are a large part of the exhibit. Many are wood or colorful with bright feathers of blue, red and green over the exterior. Most are worn in ceremonies or festivals by dancers despite being very large, one spanning over three feet in length.
"Masks are often attached to the head with strong cords, or they may fit over the head, or sit on the shoulders like the large Nimba mask," Jenkins said.
One of the large differentiations between the ethnic groups presented is whether Islam spread to the area of the people. Popular culture doesn't often associate the horse with African peoples, but some of the art displays horses as a symbol of the aristocracy and power.
"The history of the horse in North Africa is linked to the spread of Islam across the Sudan and into West Africa with the rise of the great Sudanic empires of Ghana, Mali and Songhai between the 10th and 16th centuries. This is why the image of the horse and rider is associated with conquering empires and power," Jenkins said.
"I hope to cultivate an interest in the African studies and culture in Memphis," said Jenkins.
The Brooks museum has an adult-oriented function on the first Wednesday of every month with wine and music. On December 1, regional artists will attend the function for gallery talks.
