Les Matres de la sculpture de Cte-d'Ivoire

(Masters of Sculpture from Ivory Coast)Muse du Quai Branly (Garden Gallery) 37 quai Branly, Paris 7e

14 April - 26 July, 2015

Published as Reframing Ivory Coasts Long-Anonymous Master Sculptors

http://hyperallergic.com/204874/reframing-ivory-coasts-long-anonymous-master-sculptors/

Matre du dos camber (Master of the Arched Back), Tugubl pair of Figurines from the Cte

dIvoire/Senoufo Territory (circa 1920) H. 17 cm, Private Collection Photo by Rainer Wolfsberger,

Museum Rietberg

Partial exhibition view of Masters of Sculpture from Ivory Coast photographed by Gautier Deblonde

One can easily mistakes ghosts of the past for the modern. Most of us have only a vague

and superficial idea that West African sculptures symbolic force has an innermost place

in the history of modern art, as it inspired Picasso and Braque and other adherents of

French Cubism. But the specifics are increasingly interesting.

Paul Guillaume, the French art dealer of Amedeo Modigliani, was one of the first to

organize African art exhibitions in Paris that came to the attention of Guillaume

Apollinaire, who in turn introduced them to many artists. Guillaume organized important

exhibitions such as the Premire Exposition dArt Ngre et dArt Ocanien in 1919 with

a catalogue essay by Apollinaire (who had collaborated with Guillaume on the pioneering

study Sculptures Ngres in 1917). Drawn from Guillaumes private collection, this show

placed African sculpture at the heart of modernism to the extent that when Picasso had

discovered African sculpture, he came to the realization that painting itself was a kind of

magic - and a source of mediation between the artist and a hostile world of fear and

desire.

Indeed many African art objects are mystical in function as they provide a place of

contact with several kinds of spirits, a quality they share with much of the worlds art.

African spiritual beliefs are often related to local deities and so change from one ethnic

group to another, but they have many common traits, such as the belief in a single

creator.

But to drill down a bit (Africa is enormous, more than three times the size of the

continental United States), the Cte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) - along with neighboring

Liberia, Guinea and Burkina Faso - was one of the most important regions for African art

production that was brought to Paris in the early 20th century. Masters of Sculpture from

Ivory Coast invites discovery of specifics concerning this works aesthetic power and the

sculptural masters of the various ethnic groups within the Cte d'Ivoire that made it

(Baoul, Senufo, Lobi, Guro, Dan, We, Yaour). Apparently animated by an amenable

concern for pedagogy, the Muse du Quai Branly - working with the Rietberg Museum in

Zurich and the Kunstund Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Bonn -

have here managed to bring to light a much more precise and constructive clarity to this

complex and variegated magical art.

Some sculptors here, such as The Essankro Master and The Master of the Arched Back,

are designated only by their region or style, but many others (Uopi, Kuakudili,

Nkpasopi, Tame, Sra, Tompieme, and Si, who for decades circumcised boys and initiated

them into the art of carving) now have names and stories (one, Kuakudili, has a face) and

so are slowly becoming known as individuals. Regardless of the predominantly

geographical structure of the exhibition, this individuality is sometimes established by

interpretation of the stylistic standards of the ethnic group to which the artist belongs by

means of their geographical dissemination. While each artists production (designed for

spiritual ceremonies) is of course influenced by tribal affiliation and the techniques

associated with it, their vision and personal sensitivity expressed through deliberate

aesthetic choices allows them to differ significantly from their peers. Thus Ivorian

statuary no longer appears as only a straightforward assortment of resident artisans. So

the exhibition asserts the position that Ivorian statuary is created by individual artists by

affirming the artistic identity of the master sculptors whenever possible. Not having this

problem are the contemporary artists that close the exhibition: Koffi Kouadou, Nicholas

Damas, Emile Guebehi and Jems Robert Koko Bi (born 1966 in Sinfra and now well-

known from the 2013 Venice Biennale). But mostly Masters of Sculpture from Ivory

Coast is about looking for clues of lost precedent by carving out a new passage through

unidentified statuary. We are only beginning to understand the complexity of the

symbolism in African art, wherein each element carries multiple allusions. Often a whole

ritual complex or dance cycle performed over a period of time must be seen in order to

grasp the profound cosmological references it contains. Also our understanding of

African art must remain incomplete because most African art is made of wood and other

perishable materials, thus limiting it to the 19th and 20th centuries. The earlier stages of

African arts long fruition will remain forever unknown to us. The study of African art is

thus usually not a chronological study of a sequence of artists and styles in time, but a

geographical study of styles spread over space.

Pushing back on this trend, curators Eberhard Fischer (director emeritus ethnologist from

the Rietberg Museum) and Lorenz Homberger (curator of African and Oceanian Art

there) have brought together over 300 works of the greatest sculptors and schools of

sculpture in Cte d'Ivoire. The works are here approached from the perspective of their

aesthetic power along with the individuality of the artist (or studio) who created it, rather

than from the perspective of their typology or functionality.

(left) photograph of a 1933 photograph by the German anthropologist and art collector Hans Himmelheber

of the Yaour sculptor Kuakudili and a detail of a Baoul sculpture of a male figure (right) both photos

taken at the exhibition by the author

Though the show has only one specific face to show us, that of Kuakudili from Yaour

(who, to my eye, curiously resembled a Baoul sculpture of a male figure in another

room) this show is a big step forward in introducing specific black mens names and their

workshops while still within the tribal context. Thus rendering a bit more specificity to

the geographical markers in which West African sculpture has usually been lumped.

Often this work is considered as artisanal/magical/ritual activity (and it is), but this show

stress that African art (like Western art) is produced by individual artists whose works

display personal skill, even while most African art was made not for mere admiration, but

in the service of spirits and kings. It is functional, not decorative, made to express and

support fundamental spiritual values that are perceived as essential to the survival of the

community. For this reason, African sculpture is seldom concerned with anecdote, but

rather seeks to portray a timeless essence.

Still sometimes a locations aesthetic codes and the works formal beauty are all there is

to go on, as with the particularly lovely Gouroian Masque avec animal (blier) (circa

19th century). It is a handsome object stuck in the general context of anonymous tribal art.

In cases like this, an ethnographical documentary film informed me about the social

sacred context in which the work was made and used.

Cte d'Ivoire/Gouro, Masque avec animal (blier) (Mask with animal (ram)) (circa 19th century) H. 35.7

cm, Museum Rietberg Zrich. Provenance Don de Eduard von der Heydt acquired before 1927. Photo by

Rainer Wolfsberger

At first I was confronted by the work of Dan artists (generally commissioned by

individuals who keep them for their prestige value and display them to friends) with a

focus on seven master sculptors from the villages of Belewale and Nyor Diaple. From the

Dan tribe in the region of Touba I experienced the work of Zlan (a.k.a. Sra - the creator)

who was born circa 1880 and died in 1955. Sra was the most famous sculptor of Western

Cte d'Ivoire, according to the curators, creating prestige objects and masks for many

Dan and Mano chieftains in Liberia and for important members of the Dan and We

community. Sras biographer Hans Himmelheber states that Zlans dreams revealed not

only his vocation to him, but also what forms to create, such as his outstanding piece

Maternit (Maternity) (circa 1915). It is a carving of a strong female whose eyes are

disguised with kaolin and whose mouth reveals metal teeth. The metal-mouth mother

stands powerfully, carrying her child on her back, her face and chest marked with striking

ornate scarifications. Her head is topped off by a headdress of two shells extended by

strands of woven plant fibers.

Zlan (a.k.a. Sra), Maternit (circa 1915) 63 x 20.5 cm, Dan/Cte d'Ivoire muse du quai Branly, photo

Patrick Gries, Valrie Torre

Next I came across the art of the Senufo, Lobi, Guro, We and Yaure tribes - and the

generally stunning figures and masks of Baoul artists. Such as the Matre de

Himmelhebers distinctively upwardly tilted headed Seated Male Figure Holding Cup

(circa 19th century) and Matre de Kamers elegantly sober Mask (circa 1920).

Matre de Himmelheber (The Himmelheber Master), Figurine masculine assise avec une coupe (Seated

Male Figure Holding Cup (circa 19th century) H. 38.4 cm, Cte d'Ivoire/Baoul DR Private Collection.

Provenance Hans Himmelheber collected in 1933

Baoul figures like Seated Male Figure Holding Cup were made to serve one of two

kinds of traditional spirits and never to commemorate ancestors. While the ancestors are a

potent force in the Baoul world, they are never represented in sculpture, but receive

sacrifices on stools and chairs. Rather, this Baoul carved figure is a blolo bian (spirit

husband) as he represents an ideal spouse from the other world. The carving is the locus

for this spirit spouse and becomes the center of a shrine where a jealous or vengeful spirit

spouse can be appeased. Other Baoul figures are carved for asie usu (nature spirits) that

possess or follow a person and disrupt his or her life until a shrine has been made and a

private cult established. Nature spirits often require their human companion to become a

komien (a professional spirit medium) and to do divinations for clients while in trance.

The nature spirits or the spirit spouse for whom a figure is made will indicate to the

sculptor, the client, or the diviner how the figure should be carved, and sometimes which

tree in the forest should be carved.

When individual names are lost to the curators, the exhibition places the sculptures in the

local supernatural and stylistic context of workshops, particularly amongst the Senufo,

Lobi, Dan and Baoul, by considering them from the perspective of their aesthetic power.

Some sculptors are designated only by their region but many others do have names that

are now becoming known, albeit if only by description such as from Baoul the Matre de

Himmelheber (Himmelheber Master) and Matre de Kamer (Master de Kamer), works

renowned for their refinement within formal diversity. Matre de Kamers Baouls

Mask (circa 1920) was worn for dances where masks represented natural forces,

animals or general human types, such as slave, prostitute, or dandy.

Matre de Kamer (Master de Kamer), Mask (circa 1920) H. 20 cm, Cte dIvoire/Baoul Frdric

Dehaen - Studio Asselberghs. Private Collection. Provenance Hans Rthlingshfer (Ble) acquired in 1958

From Senoufo I came upon the Matre des Duonou (Master of Duonu) and the Matre du

dos camber (Master of the Arched Back) as the sculptors did not sign their works, and

their names have fallen into oblivion. I therefore do not know for certain whether the

sculptures attributed to the Master of the Rounded Volumes were all done by the same

person or not, even though all his female figures stand perfectly upright and have

muscular symmetrical legs and arms and rather rounded buttocks.

Nkpasopi a.k.a. Matre des volumes arrondis (Master of the Rounded Volumes), Figurine Fminine

(Female Figure) (circa 1900) H. 25 cm, Cte d'Ivoire/Kyaman Muse Barbier-Mueller, Genve.

Provenance Josef Muller acquired before 1939. Photo by Studio Ferrazzini Bouchet

Matre des Duonou (Master of Duonu), Zuhu Mask with Bird Head (circa 1920) H. 44 cm, Cte

d'Ivoire/Gouro, Provenance Hans Himmelheber acquired before 1934 Museum der Kulturen, Basel

The exhibition closes with its insistence on an historical consciousness of the individual

artist. This insistence drives a stake in the heart of a once widespread eschatological

rhetoric: that personal orientation within the time-space of modernity has evaporated into

a myriad of cultural amnesia that hovers behind post-historical reality. This post-

historical reality is usually described as an implosion of avant-garde into post-avant-

garde positioning within the framework of a post-modernity that has been dominated by

the end of history. The end of the traditional artist, notably via the famous death of

painting, has been a familiar slogan of the artistic avant-gardes since the 1920s, when

artists like Kazimir Malevich proclaimed that painting had lived out its life, and the

painter is nothing but a prejudice of the past. This anti-art(ist) position was reiterated by

some proponents of Conceptual Art, Arte Povera, Land Art - and amplified by Roland

Barthes and Michel Foucault when they proclaimed the death of the author as creator

and guarantor of meaning. To be replaced with the author function. Call in the stealth

infrastructure of anonymous algorithms.

This show strives to clarify the singular creators behind forever-mysterious masterpieces,

thus helping us take note of the exhaustion of that speculative eschatological discourse,

one that tried to displace legitimacy from the private aesthetic realm to the social-

political. (Duh, it takes both.) Even as the question of regional style is still a thorny one,

this show manages to cut against the always threatening anonymous (one might say

corporate) urge so as to attach and highlight particular names and community workshops

of the artists/magicians who made these charmed objects. Objects whose task was to

reveal universal Spirit in particular sensuous form.

Joseph Nechvatal

Matre de la coiffure en crte de coq (Master of the cockscomb hairstyle), Couple de figurines tugubl

(Tugubl Figurine Couple) (circa 1930) 24.5 x 25.7 cm. Cte dIvoire/Snoufo Collection Marianne &

Helmut Zimmer Museum Rietberg Zrich. Photo by Rainer Wolfsberger

Matre d'Essankro (The Essankro Master), Figure masculine debout (Standing Male Figure) (circa 1880)

H. 43.5 cm DR Private Collection. Provenance Paul Guillaume collected in 1935

Jems Robert Koko Bi, Diaspora II (2013) (left) & Ancestors (2011) (right) Private Collection Jems

Robert Koko Bi

Partial exhibition view of Masters of Sculpture from Ivory Coast photographed by Gautier Deblonde