representing africa in american art museums

The Cincinnati Art Museum’s Steckelmann Collection

As one of the first art museums in the United States to purchase and display African art, the Cincinnati Art museum’s Steckelmann collection was extremely successful and highly praised in its time. It also gives us our first look at the collection and representation of African in American art museums, and gives us a glimpse of late-nineteenth-century collectors’ practices regarding African art. Steckelmann himself was born in Germany, immigrated to the US, and decided at eighteen that he wished to explore Africa – an English trading house employed him, and he traveled up and down the Congo River for ten years, collecting more than 1,425 objects. After returning to the United States, he presented his collection (along with tales of his explorations and discoveries) at various colleges and scientific societies and left it for safe keeping at the Cincinnati Art Museum. Exhibitions were billed as animals, objects, and a prince from “SAVAGE AFRICA”, indicating the time period’s conception of Africa as alien, uncivilized, and exotic.

In addition, the things that Steckelmann chose to collect indicate the attitudes of collectors and the public at the time – based on the exhibition in Cincinnati, his collection focused not on “the beauty of individual objects but… the powerful visual presence created by works large in size… or large in number”, like a model house or a large assortment of fiber mats (22). What we often consider “African art” nowadays (figural sculptures, masks, etc.) went fairly unseen. This, however, isn’t to say that there were no important examples of art in the Steckelmann collection – the book mentions a female figure, a mask, and several other models. There is also evidence that Steckelmann commissioned works specifically for his collection, rather than acquiring already-existing pieces that reflected the lives and cultures of the people he met. However, his notes explain little about these objects, and any documentation of the meaning or origin of the pieces remains sadly incomplete.

For today’s museums, and in light of current research/collection practices, this presents a challenge. The Steckelmann collection was “probably the first museum in America to show [any] African art as art, and not just as incidental ethnography” (34). However, contemporary art museums nowadays tend to seek acquisition of “aesthetic” pieces – that is, unique works of art from cultures around Africa – and Steckelmann’s objects are varied in this artistic quality (35).

 

The Brooklyn Museum

The Brooklyn Museum was also one of the first museums to collect and display objects of African culture –this museum’s collections are noted for their quality, size, and success in exposing American culture to African art. It is unclear how the original “starter” objects in the Brooklyn’s collection came to the museum, but we do know that Stewart Culin (the first curator of ethnology) spearheaded the efforts to build and develop an African collection of art in the 1920s. Former director of the UPenn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, he was intrigued by the concept of “primitivism”; basically, he was enamoured by “primitive” and “folk” cultures and believed that these cultures were closer to nature, more expressive, and less corrupted by modernity. He also noted the effect of African sculpture on modern European artists, and decided that Americans also needed to see the power and beauty of African art (63).

While traveling, he acquired multiple African pieces, mostly from other collectors and dealers, and used them to organize an exhibition. It was both the largest display of African art ever assembled, and “the first time that any museum had devoted a full-scale exhibition to African objects as art”, as artistic expressions rather than ethnographical objects. His primary interest was aesthetic – he arranged the installation not by ethnic group or place of origin, but by object type (masks, pottery, etc.) – demonstrating what could be considered either a lack of information about the objects themselves, or a single-minded focus on form. The exhibit itself also influenced artists, writers, and other Black Americans who looked to Africa “as a source of cultural pride”, in addition to providing new inspiration for American industries. Chairs, clothing, hats, blankets – Culin fostered collaboration between the museum and American designers and manufacturers. His focus on “refined” forms of art, like that of the Kuba, Luba, and Kongo peoples for their royal courts, may have biased art museum collections against other styles of African art (like that found in the western savanna regions, for example).

After Culin, the Brooklyn Museum acquired other collections -- these were more ethnographic (consisting of tools and weapons). Later, the Brooklyn would host the first exhibition to refer to African pieces as “masterpieces”, setting them on equal footing with that of European art; like its predecessors at the Brooklyn, this exhibit placed a high value on the form, beauty, and technique of African art. Later still, as the collection expanded, curators would develop new ways of displaying art, with a focus on historical and cultural context… the Brooklyn followed, arranging its new installations by region and ethnic group, although continuing to primarily emphasize African objects as fine art.

Most recently, a permanent exhibition was installed that combined large photographs of ceremony and cultural events with Brooklyn’s objects, using music, wall panels, and video to frame and contextualize the art. The Brooklyn Museum’s many exhibition evolutions help us to think about how museum values (and subsequently, presentations) regarding African art have shifted through the years.

Cleveland Museum of Art

The Cleveland Museum of Art was created with two goals in mind: to educate a broad audience and to collect the best art from every region and time period. The collection has always included “traditional” sub-Saharan African works, with the first objects acquired in 1915, a year before the museum officially opened. These works were acquired for the Extensions Division of the museum’s Department of Education - under the guidance of the museum’s first director, Frederich Whiting, and “with the assumption that children would respond directly to ‘primitive’ cultures, the objects accumulated in the Extensions Division” (109). Whiting also believed that African art was inherently ethnographic and didn’t deserve its own gallery space.

In 1920, the board of trustees agreed to support an initiative by Karamu House (a local African-American theater) funding local artist and teacher Paul Travis’s expedition to Africa to collect art. Louise Dunn, who worked in the CMA’s Education Department was largely responsible for this decision, as she worked to change Whiting’s attitude towards African art and lobbied the board to support the initiative. In 1929, the museum established the Department of Primitive Art, which lasted until 1940. In June and July of 1929, the works Travis brought back from his expedition were displayed in the “Exhibition of Primitive Negro Art of Africa.” The exhibit focused on the aesthetic value of the collection, “evok[ing] the innovative formal analysis developed a few years earlier by Albert Barnes” (109). While intended to prove the legitimacy of the CMA’s African collection, the exhibit highlighted many of its weaknesses and need for more works.

In 1935 the CMA hosted a touring version of the Museum of Modern Art’s “African Negro Art” which “played a key role in the ‘emancipation’ and appreciation of African art in the United States” (112). The exhibit used minimalist design to emphasize the aesthetic value of the African works, rejecting the common practice of ethnographic displays. The CMA’s version of “African Negro Art” was not quite as austere as the MOMA’s original curation, and was actually quite similar to their “Exhibition of Primitive Negro Art of Africa.” “African Negro Art” was followed by several other influential touring exhibits in the 30s, followed by a complete absence exhibits and very little collecting until the 60s.

Interest in African art at the CMA was reinvigorated in the 60s by a Philadelphia exhibit curated by Margaret Plass(aka one of BMC’s major donors) and Katherine Coryton White’s donation of 126 African works to the CMA. In 1962 the first permanent African art gallery was opened to display the White collection, with an anthropological focus.In 2003, it was renovated and reopened with a greater focus on aesthetic.

In 2002, the CMA hired their first curator specializing in African art.

New York’s Museum of Primitive Art

The Museum of Primitive Art was founded by Nelson Rockefeller and René d’Harnoncourt in 1954, the first museum dedicated to art from Africa, Oceania, and the Americas for aesthetic value rather than ethnographic/anthropological significance.The MPA closed in 1974, when its collection was transferred to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The first phase of the collection is a series of 160 works purchased by Rockefeller with d’Harnoncourt’s advice between 1949 and 1956. Rockefeller likely began collecting African art under the influence of the MOMA’s 1935 “African Negro Art” and 1948 “Timeless Aspects of Modern Art” which “radically decontextualized” so-called primitive art, mixing it with modern paintings and sculptures. Rockefeller only cared about the art’s aesthetic value, not its context, writing “It is not the tribal characteristics of Negro art nor its strangeness that are interesting. It is its plastic qualities.” (Here plastic meaning sculptural form). d’Harnoncourt chose items adhering to his ideal of African art, which was shaped by the existing canon. He and Rockefeller purchased works demonstrating “modified naturalism, genteel abstraction, and polished surfaces” with the exception of some more “cubistic” Luluwa and Bamana sculptures. The collection was almost entirely composed of figural sculptures and masks from West and Central Africa.

The second phase of the MPA’s collection departed from this canon under the guidance of Robert Goldwater, the museum’s director. Goldwater had a more complex understanding of African art, having studied both its anthropological context and aesthetic value. He assisted with the formative 1935 “African Negro Art.” Goldwater emphasized the diversity of African art and artists. He still collected only figural sculptures and masks from West and Central Africa, and excluded any modern African art.

Before the museum closed, it showed over 70 exhibits, published almost 60 books, and had a collection of 3500 works, 800 of which were African. This collection, though very small compared to the influential anthropological museums with tens of thousands of objects, was incredibly influential on American perceptions of African art.

Art Institute of Chicago

The display of African art at the Art Institute of Chicago has undergone many changes since its first acquisitions African works of art in the 1920s.

The Art Institute was built to serve as the site of the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893. People nationwide “flocked to the city to see the expositions” centered on trade, industrialization, technology, and the accomplishments of society (150). At the Chicago’s World’s Fair, the exposition was divided in two. One section popularly referred to as the “White City” was “a utopian vision laid out in neat avenues...representing to many the superiority of the industrial West” (, 150). The other section, called “the Midway Plaisance, in contrast, was a sprawling series of carnival-like sideshows that included romanticized recreations of rural and urban life as found in Africa and other parts of the world” (150-151). This stark distinction between Western and African civilization is a line that would be upheld, blurred, and broken down over time.

African art initially found its way into the Art Institute through its constituent museum, the Children’s Museum. It “was not held to the same professional standards as other curatorial departments,” and the relegation of African art to the Children’s Museum was a reflection of the notion that “African art would appeal to less mature sensibilities and, perhaps more significantly, that the work of its artists was comparable to that of children” (151). The exclusion of African art from the Art Institute’s main galleries was an indication of widely held beliefs among museum curators and the general public.

Early exhibitions of African art was intended to show “‘the progress of the Negro in art dating from the primitive to the modern’” and in doing so “suggested a continuum between these works” (152). The Chicago Woman’s Club organized a “Negro in Art Week” in 1927 to show exactly this progression, and in a document including application information for African artists and details about the exhibition, it was determined that submissions “must conform near as possible to standards set by regular art museum standards” and artists were encouraged to submit only their best work to be approved for inclusion in this “epoch-making exhibition” (Charles C. Dawson). Additionally, the document notified artists that “effort will be made to keep prices as low as possible” in the sales of these works after exhibition.

Westerners were fascinated with Africa during this time of expanding colonial activities, and their paternalistic attitude “extended to black American culture, which was seen as an exotic subculture of mainstream America...‘as African descendants, the American Negro was the modern primitive’” (152-153). African artists were invited to display their work in galleries only if it met the aesthetic standards of European art. Curators were more interested in “black purveyors of Western civilization,” rather than Black art in itself (153).

The 1950s and 1960s saw many reassessments of African art. Art historians continued the trend of associating African art with modern art, citing “primitive” art as inspiration for modernist works. This comparison lead curators to begin juxtaposing African art with modern art. Eliot Elisofon, a photographer, took photos of African art “reminiscent of cubism and futurism” and exhibited them with African sculptures to compel the museumgoer to appreciate the aesthetic commonalities (155). However, the “depersonalized and interpretive photographs next to only minimally identified works” had the effect of decontextualizing the African art from their cultural meanings, instead focusing solely on their aesthetic appeal (155).

The Elisofon exhibit prompted the Art Institute to form a Department of Primitive Art in 1957. This department dealt with works of art of pre-Columbian, Oceanic, and Native American origin as well, grouping them all under the “primitive” category. Other prominent museums followed in the Institute’s footsteps, establishing departments for “primitive” art. They appointed curators without a background in African art, a practice that would continue for quite some time, even as interest in the study of African art was growing. At the same time, primitive art advocates formed “strong ties” with the Museum of Modern Art, “the recognized bastion for modernism in the United States” (156). Galleries exhibiting African art were heavily influenced by the MoMA, which is somewhat ironic, since modern art was influenced by African art. The Art Institute continued to expand its collection of African art, although they were dedicated on acquiring pieces of aesthetic merit. The Art Institute was, and continues to be, considered a “masterpiece museum, devoted to collecting works of the highest aesthetic quality” (Berzock, 161). This “insistence on the detailed consideration of the artistic merit of individual objects set a standard for excelled” among curatorial departments nationwide and among collectors. Again leaning on the MoMA, the “aestheticized and decontextualized” exhibition of African art became standardized in museums (158-159).

Towards the late 20th century and into the 21st century, field of scholarship concerned with African art continued to grow and become specialized. Museums still relied on long-standing ties with private collectors for loans and donations of art, but they began to engage with local African American communities through outreach programs. The display of African art was also undergoing transformations, and exhibitions were adopting a “much broader interpretation of what constituted African art,” moving beyond their preoccupation with figural sculpture to include functional art as well as other mediums (160). Museums, “recognizing the importance of African art to the museum,” also hired specialists who were trained Africanists to create more diverse collections and programming (161). Inside the Art Institute, “contextualization has been given a greater role to play,” and new emphasis has been placed on the historicity of certain African works. Museums nationwide are renewing their “commitment to representing Africa” in all its complexity and beauty.

National Museum of African Art

The National Museum of African Art, originally called the Center for Cross-Cultural Communication, located in a townhouse owned by Frederick Douglass in Washington, D.C., was a landmark institution since it was “the first American museum devoted exclusively to the research, acquisition, and exhibition of African art” (265). It was dedicated to “intercultural understanding through programs in the social sciences and the arts” (265). Its foundation coincided with the “height of the civil rights movement,” which would come to influence its artistic direction and aims as a museum. Its small size and independence separated it from other museums, although it would eventually be absorbed into the Smithsonian museum complex, when it would be renamed the National Museum of African Art.

The museum was uniquely positioned, as an independent institution, to cooperate with local communities and to tap into the resources within them. It was “praised for its intimate scale and friendly atmosphere” (268). The museum also employed people of African descent, whose skills “proved useful for museum programming” as drummers, painters, and artisans (267). These works were “subsequently obtained by the museum” (267). The director, curator, and fundraiser of the museum, Warren M. Robbins, worked hard to develop the museum even without the financial support and administrative structure of a larger museum. As a privately funded museum, the NMAA was “almost entirely dependent on the donation of objects,” and was unable to amass a large collection of African art in its pre-Smithsonian years (267). The NMAA’s dependence on donations was complicated by its educational mission and status as a small, independent museum. Many pieces were donated to be used in an educational setting, but “some objects were donated with the specific understanding that they could later be disposed of to raise money for the museum or if a like work of higher quality was obtained” (268). Schoolchildren were frequent visitors to the NMAA, and programs “were conducted with various government agencies, foreign embassies, and educational and business groups,” reflecting the extent to which the museum as an institution fulfilled a role of telling a national story and painting a certain picture of the society at large (269). Its Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives were a successful part of the NMAA’s collection, and it “rapidly became a resource for other museums, scholars, teachers, and publishers” (269). The Elisofon Archives is one example that illustrates the extent of the influence of a museum exhibit, of one artist.

Within Robbins’ museum was a “comparative gallery” that was inspired by Robbins’ trips abroad to Europe. It was “an exhibition space reserved for juxtaposing original works of African art with reproduction prints of European and American modern art,” curated with the intent of showing visitors “how to look at works of art” (269). In the tradition of the Art Institute, African art in the NMAA was juxtaposed with different genres of art (modern, European, etc.) in order to elicit a certain appreciation of it. It is interesting that different museum officials made the same curatorial choice to exhibit African art in relation to, or compared with other forms of art to compel the viewer to see the artistic value in African masterworks.

The NMAA was incorporated into the Smithsonian Institution in 1979 in a proposal made by Warren Robbins “in order to ensure its continued solvency and stability” (269). This proposal was accompanied by the decision to construct a new home for the art on the National Mall, at a new NMAA. The Smithsonian’s “unrestricted funds” and reputation meant that the NMAA would have more access to different collections, an enhanced ability to acquire new pieces, and the opportunity to develop strong relationships with other museums (270). The museum’s early years as a Smithsonian institution were marked by the “expanding parameters of African art history,”  in which ambitious exhibitions were created to bring attention to previously unexplored aspects of African art, such as “depictions of foreigners” and “expressions of Islamic culture and creativity” (270). The Smithsonian’s wealth and federal funds helped the NMAA make important acquisitions to diversify their burgeoning collection, including all kinds of objects of everyday life that had aesthetic value. This work stretched the “boundaries of the African art canon,” informed by modernism in midcentury years, by colonial attitudes and other byproducts of the World’s Fair/colonial era.

The NMAA was opened in 1987 on the National Mall in D.C. The facility was built partially underground, and its partially subterranean architecture proved to be an obstacle in advertising the museum to potential visitors. However, the new NMAA had much more space for exhibits and it used this newly acquired space to host temporary exhibitions. The new museum came with a “redefined identity and an expanded agenda...with implications that extended far beyond the environs of Washington” (271). The national mission of the NMAA conferred onto it an increased responsibility to “maintain and enhance its presence and relevancy to such a vast and diverse audience base” (283).

The elevation of African art to the altitude of that which was considered “high art” was an important event in African American art history. These new exhibitions were “interrogating the very categories that have shaped perceptions of African art,” all the while providing a means of appreciating it for its beauty (271). The contextual quality of the art improved as well, and it is significant that new exhibitions included “works by named artists...which together countered public perceptions of the ‘anonymous’ African artist” (273). These artists included the famed master artist Olowe of Ise, Bamgboshe of Osi-Ilorin, and Sakadiba. New frameworks for appreciating African art encouraged museums to begin collecting contemporary African art, to engage with “critical issues in African art history,” and to question the ways African art was “constrained by local stylistic conventions” (274). It was a movement towards a greater understanding these works of art for their aesthetic appeal and for their cultural significance. In addition to this, an increased interest in African culture lead to exhibitions that showcased complex topics, for example, the “role of textiles in Malagasy gender and ethnic identities” (274). The increased contextualization and scholarship dedicated to African art changed public and private attitudes towards African art.

In the NMAA today, there is increased scholarly expertise in the subject areas of African art, more conversations about modern and contemporary art, and commitments have been made to collaborate with artists and local communities. The exhibition of tradition-based and modern art together is still in practice today, but it is less standardized and, rather, done “when appropriate” (277). The first curator of modern and contemporary art at the NMAA, Elizabeth Harney, brought “expertise not only in the contemporary visual arts of the continent but also in the arts of the diaspora, the processes of globalization, and the politics of representation” (278). Museums have been given space to tell and retell history, set the national agenda, and to act as the place of public education and art appreciation. Now, even as museums face new financial and conservation challenges, they are renewing their commitments to have a dialogue with living artists and communities whose work they house in their galleries. They are revisiting old traditions with new lenses, reevaluating works of art, and repopulating the canon with contemporary pieces that refresh common sensibilities about African art.   

Works Cited

Bickford, K and Clarke, C. 2011. Representing Africa in American Art Museums: A Century of Collecting and Display. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

Dawson, Charles C., b. 1889. 'Negro in Art' Week of the Chicago Women's Club, November 1927. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries