Happenings

***NEW***
Striking tribal jewelry at New York’s TAMBARAN Gallery underscores the universal ritual of personal expression through Millennia and redefines the word, “Adornment”. For over thirty years Maureen Zarember has offered an amazingly diverse array of unique Tribal Jewelry that has attracted the most celebrated collectors: A hair ornament from Tamil Nadu made of 37 radiating gold spikes; 19th century 22K Gold + Turquoise Ear Ornaments from Lhasa-Tibet; a Southwestern Indian pendant of turquoise and blood coral once owned by Andy Warhol; a Hawaiian carved sperm whale ivory Necklace. More information available on the web site.

The "Musée des Confluences" in Lyon received in 2000 an important donation of African Objects from a couple of Lyon in France, Michel et Denise Meynet, both fascinated by a common subject: finding objects that tell stories and talk about the societies.
The exhibition invites the public to share the passion of these two collectors by showing the diversity and the wealth of a collection up for 10 years with a network of dealers.

In case you are a museum or an institution , note that you could host the exhibition at your place for free. For more information, you can download the presentation (in French).

Africa of our reserves - Collections in Rhône-Alpes
Exotic objects, fetish objects, artistic productions of black Africa are coming out of their reserves. They were given to the Rhône-Alpes museums by travellers, missionaries and artists. They reflect the aesthetic values identified by museums and marketing channels. Today they are considered as masterpieces. The exhibition takes the story of it, between perfumes of exoticism and art market speculations.
The web site of the exhibition

***NEW***
A world-class collection of Anatolian kilims given to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco by H. McCoy Jones and his wife, Caroline, is showcased in a choice exhibition of two dozen of the finest examples. Presented in the textile arts gallery at the de Young, the Anatolian flat-woven kilims on view, dating from the 15th to the 19th century, include a variety of design types and regional styles, as well as superb examples of artistic and visual prowess. The kilims in the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco’s permanent collection are considered the most important group of Anatolian kilims outside Turkey.

Through some seventy-five works from American private collections and the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art, this exhibition celebrates the stunning formal diversity and deep cultural meanings of Southern Africa’s artistic heritage. Despite having enjoyed a degree of growing interest and appreciation over the past three decades, the art of traditional Southern African societies has long been largely neglected. The aesthetic merits of objects stemming from this part of the African continent are still largely underrated within the field of African art, often being described as “craft” rather than “art.”
View the exhibition website

Oceanic Art
Auction: Saturday February 11th, 10 am in San Francisco.
Preview: February 8-10. Catalogue available on line.

In 1984, the Art Centre received the spectacular gift of almost 600 hundred works of African art, from a wide and diverse range of cultures in West and Central Africa, including Nigeria, Mali, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Gabon and Democratic Republic of Congo. These objects were collected in the mid-20th century by Montrealers Justin and Elisabeth Lang, and represent one of the strongest concentrations of African art in Canadian public collections.
With Collecting Visions, the Agnes Etherington Art center draw once again from this outstanding resource, this time to consider some of the cultural motivations underlying the Langs’ collecting practices within the context of mid- 20th century western understandings of the art and artists of the African continent.
Web site of the exhibition

This exhibition unmasks the fluid and dynamic nature of art and the local spheres of interaction, adaptation, and transformation in which objects have moved. Over the centuries, the Benue River Valley witnessed a confluence of peoples, institutions, and ideas that is only now beginning to be understood as having resulted in one of the major artistic legacies of Africa.

As from November 27th, "Africacentrum" will welcome "Congo" has guest of honour. The exhibition of Tony Jorissen organized in 1966 in Hasselt is reissued for 2 months in Cadier en Keer
Statues and masks from the ex-collections of Alan Steele, Pierre Dartevelle or Alain Guisson, will guide you through the Kongo, Yaka, Kuba, Songye, Luba, Hemba and Lega styles, which make the richness of this big country.

This exhibition shows how very "ordinary" albums from the colonial period can provide a unique insight into the colonial experience. Colonial albums are common, owned by many families who where involved in colonial activities, such as administration, missions, engineering, medical work or teaching. They are now recognised as important historical documents, and yet they are rarely seen.
They albums exhibited were produced by Percy Coriat, Ernest Emley and Wiliam Freer Hill between 1905 and 1935, and relate the periods spent in Sudan, Kenya and Nigeria respectively. Web site of the exhibition.