Result of the research : 'traditionnelle'
African traditional masks
There are an enormous variety of masks used in Africa. In West Africa, masks are used in masquerades that form part of religious ceremonies enacted to contact with spirits and ancestors.
The Yoruba, Igbo and Edo cultures, including Egungun Masquerades and Northern Edo Masquerades. The masks are usually carved with an extraordinary skill and variety by artists who will usually have received their training as an apprentice to a master carver - frequently it is a tradition that has been passed down within a family through many generations. Such an artist holds a respected position in tribal society because of the work that he/she creates, embodying not only complex craft techniques but also spiritual/social and symbolic knowledge. African masks are also used in the Mas or Masquerade of the Caribbean Carnival.
African masks are made from different materials: wood, bronze, brass, copper, ivory, terra cotta and glazed pottery, raffia and textiles. Some African masks are colourful. Many African masks represent animals. Some African tribes believe that the animal masks can help them communicate with the spirits who live in forests or open savannas. People of Burkina Faso known as the Bwa and Nuna call to the spirit to stop destruction. The Dogon of Mali have complex religions that also have animal masks. Their beliefs are in three main cults - the Awa, cult of the dead, Bini, cult of communication with spirits and Lebe, cult of earth and nature. These three main cults nevertheless use seventy-eight different types of masks. Most of the ceremonies of the Dogon culture are secret, although the antelope dance is shown to non-Dogons. The antelope masks are rough rectangular boxes with several horns coming out of the top. The Dogons are expert agriculturists and the antelope symbolizes a hard working farmer.
Another culture that has a very rich agricultural tradition is the
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Les collections d'art africain dans les musées du monde
L'Amérique
Bermudes
Hamilton
Bermuda National Gallery
City Hall, Church Street
lu-sa 10-16
Arts d'Afrique occidentale: Bamana, Bwa, Bete, Guro, Yaoure, Senufo, Ashanti, Yoruba, Ibo, Bamileke...
Brésil
Bahia
Museu Afro-Brasileiro. Universidade Federal da Bahia
Terreiro de Jesus
ma-sa 9-17
Arts et objets cultuels d'Afrique Noire: Yoruba...
Sao Paulo
Museu de Arqueologia e Etnologia. Universidade de Sao Paulo
Cidade Universitaria. Av. Prof Almeida Prado
ma-ve 9-17; sa 10-14
Ethnographie de l'Afrique noire. Exposition permanente "Culturas e Sociedades"
Canada
Calgary
Glenbow Museum
130 9th Avenue S.E.
ma-di 9-17
Arts d'Afrique occidentale: Baga, Senufo, Ashanti, Yoruba, Ibo, Yaunde, Bamileke... (non exposés en permanence)
Kingston (Ontario)
Agnes Etherington Art Centre. Queens University
Queens University Campus
ma-ve 10-17; sa-di 13-17
Arts d'Afrique occidentale: Bidyogo, Dogon, Bamana, Bankoni, Mossi, Dan, Senufo, Baule, Yaure, Anyi, Ashanti, Fanti...
Arts du Nigeria: Yoruba, Ibo, Urhobo, Koro, Mama, Kaka...
Arts du Gabon et du Congo: Fang, Kota, Bembe, Kongo, Yombe, Pende, Luba, Hemba, Lega, Songye, Tshokwe... (Coll. Lang)
Montréal
Musée des beaux-arts
1379-1380 rue
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Black African Literature
Modern literature of Black Africa lies at the confluence of various trends: its
own traditions and diverse, the impact of Islamic and Arab worlds;
the pervasive influence of European colonialism and Christianity. Africans
have been particularly prolific since the Second World War;
using French, English, Portuguese and more than forty African languages, they
made up of poetry, fiction, drama, and invented forms of writing
for which there is no description in the European literary world. Their
works portray the modern political and social reality, and focus on
value systems, whether or not African. At the same time, their writings
are based on indigenous traditions and world views typically
Africa.
Long before Europeans arrived, even before the development of writing,
peoples of sub-Saharan Africa have expressed their thoughts in an artistic manner,
their feelings and concerns the deepest in the form of myths,
legends, allegories, parables and stories, songs and chants from
poems, proverbs, riddles and theater. Some traditional forms of
oral literature have survived until today, while new forms do
cease to
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Africa since 1935
Research Director
Professor A. A. Mazrui (Kenya)
Co-Director
C. Wondji (Ivory Coast)
Arts and society since 1935
J. VANSINA
Across Africa today the arts give the show an amazing cauldron of creativity emerged with a dizzying diversity of all layers of society. Many new artistic trends date from the second half of the colonial period. Besides, some pioneers are still working today. After all, it is past two generations since 1935. But in that short time, the artistic activity was a richness and diversity as this chapter may at most trace the main lines of its evolution (1).
Initially, we must enumerate a few general features of social and cultural matrix that is all. These are: the growing impact but unevenly distributed in Europe, the growth of cities, social stratification more trenches that lead to the formation of new classes, the industrial division of time has reached the beaches of leisure may be devoted to the practice and enjoyment of the arts, the prestige associated with the technical and technical training, changing the place and role of the artist in society, past status of artisan to that of cultural soothsayer The change in attitude toward art and their use, alteration of values in general and more specifically the changing religious values. The multiplication of objects of artistic production offers new opportunities, these are just
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Africa under colonial rule, 1880-1935
Research Director
Professor A. A. Boahen (Ghana)
In February 1976, in Nigeria, a man was arrested at a police checkpoint between Ibadan and Lagos. He was carrying two bags full of bronze sculptures and wood on suspicion of having stolen it affirmât well as the owner. Upon inquiry, the man telling the truth. Recently converted to Islam, he lived and worked in Ibadan at a community center. The effigies of deities carved Yoruba he was carrying had been brought in Ibadan, like many others, by migrant workers to satisfy the spiritual aspirations of these artisans, shopkeepers, civil servants and other migrant workers in their temporary residence. But the leader of the community, having converted to Islam, began in turn to convert their neighbors. Converted in his turn, the suspect heard himself served as symbols of their ancient faith were to disappear to allow the community center to become a dwelling worthy of the spiritual presence of Allah. Unable to consider destroying these objects, he resolved to return to his village, place of origin, where they have since been resettled.
This incident is a perfect example of the evolution of cultural forms and their concrete manifestation and at the same time, the survival or the renewal of cultural values from specific forms of domination, whether of a religious or more clearly social. What remained true in 1976 was even more common during this period particularly dramatic external domination of Africa, which saw the submission of an entire people, its social
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The Quai Branly museum is set on quai
Branly in the 7th district of Paris, where was located the Foreign Exchange
Market Department. Ambitious project led by Jacques Chirac (passionated by « primitive
art ») and realised by Jean Nouvel, it has been unveiled the 20th of June
2006. History Jacques Kerchache, art seller and african art expert, tried from the
begining of the 1990’s to bring the « primitive arts » into the
Louvre museum. In 1990 he signed in the newpaper Libération an article on this
topic ; the same year he met Jacques Chirac, then mayor of Paris. The latter is elected president of the Republic in 1995. As soon as he
arrived at the head of the State, he askes for the opening of a primitive art department
at the Louvre museum. One year later he announced the project of creation of a
new museum, which quickly meet an opposition, especially with a strike of the personnal of the Man
museum in 1999, to stand in the way of the disassembly of the museum’s
collections and criticize the primacy of the aesthetic choice instead of the
scientific factors. An architecture competition is sent out in 1999, designating Jean Nouvel as
the architect. This museum is unveiled the 20th of June 2006 by Jacques
Chirac, in the presence of Kofi Annan, Rigoberta Menchú, Paul Okalik, Dominique
de Villepin, Lionel Jospin and Jean-Pierre Raffarin. The Quai Branly museum has
the status of public administratove institution. It’s placed under the guardianship
of the Department of Culture and
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Claude Lévi-Strauss, né le 28 novembre 1908 à Bruxelles, est un anthropologue, ethnologue et philosophe français. Professeur honoraire au Collège de France, dont il a occupé la chaire d'anthropologie sociale de 1959 à 1982, et membre de l'Académie française, dont il est devenu le premier centenaire, il compte parmi les premiers théoriciens de la pensée structuraliste. Depuis ses premiers travaux sur les Indiens du Brésil, qu'il a étudiés sur le terrain entre 1935 et 1939, et la publication de sa thèse Les Structures élémentaires de la parenté en 1949, il a produit une œuvre scientifique dont les apports ont été reconnus au plan international. Il a ainsi consacré une tétralogie, les Mythologiques, à l'étude des mythes. Mais il a également publié des ouvrages qui sortent du strict cadre des études académiques, dont le plus célèbre, Tristes Tropiques, publié en 1955, l'a fait connaître et apprécier d'un vaste cercle de lecteurs. Biographie Enfance et formation Claude Lévi-Strauss, issu d'une famille juive d'origine alsacienne, est né à Bruxelles de parents français. Son père était un peintre portraitiste, qui fut ruiné par l'arrivée de la photographie et son grand-père maternel était le rabbin de la synagogue de Versailles. Il fait ses études secondaires à Paris aux lycées Janson-de-Sailly et Condorcet ; puis des études supérieures à la faculté de droit de Paris (licence) et à la Sorbonne (troisième à l'agrégation de philosophie en
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Georges Braque Georges Braque, né à Argenteuil (Seine-et-Oise, actuellement Val-d'Oise) le 13 mai 1882 et mort à Paris le 31 août 1963, était un peintre et sculpteur français. Il fut, avec Pablo Picasso, l'un des initiateurs du cubisme. Biographie Georges Braque : « Je fuis mon semblable, dans tout semblable il y a un sosie. » Georges Braque grandit au sein d’une famille d’artisans. Il passe sa jeunesse au Havre et étudie à l'École des Beaux-Arts de 1897 à 1899 dirigé par Charles Lhuillier. Il y fait la connaissance d'Othon Friesz. Sa première formation comme peintre décorateur, il la doit à son père, Charles Braque, entrepreneur-peintre en bâtiment. À Paris, il suit les cours d'un maître décorateur et obtient son certificat d'artisanat en 1901. L'année suivante, il entre à l'académie Humbert qu'il fréquente jusqu'en 1904. C'est là qu'il rencontre Marie Laurencin et Francis Picabia. Du fauvisme au cubisme Il peint ses premières œuvres sous l'influence de l'impressionnisme jusqu'à ce qu'il découvre au Salon d’Automne de 1905 les toiles d'Henri Matisse et d'André Derain. Puis débute une collaboration artistique avec Othon Friesz avec qui il fait un séjour à Anvers, puis l'année suivante à L'Estaque (Bouches-du-Rhône) d'où il rapporte des tableaux fauves aux couleurs pures et aux compositions géométriques. ( « Souvenirs d'Anvers » ). Ses tableaux sont exposés en mars 1906 au Salon des indépendants.
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Even presented beyond their ethnographic context, the female representations produced by African artists remain strong, both aesthetic choices remain compelling. The Eye Gallery and the Main has a selection of works whose wife is the central subject: maternity, reliquaries, dolls, locks, seats, fetishes, puppets, masks ... all traditional works produced for different purposes, often very utilitarian and share the lack of realism. Yet, the authority that comes from a Dogon figure, is the opposite of the impression that emanates submission in general models of feminine beauty, like the masks of pwo Tchokwe, which are worn by men, but also for the elaborate hairstyles of Mende, who are nevertheless confined exclusively female company. It can be found most touching a small doll of a woman Mossi biga fertility has focused on her and treated as his own child. It is just a simple piece of wood without arms or legs whose femininity is limited to a few signs - hair, eyes, breasts, ports - but just how easy and how success in abstraction.
"FEMINAFRICA" of Wednesday, May 17 to Friday, June 30, 2006.
African Art / African Art / primitive art / primitive art / primitive arts / art gallery / art Tribal / Tribal Art / Africa / Africa / eye and hand / first art gallery / buy / sell / expertise / expert / exposure / exhibition / collection / collectors / Paris / work / Verneuil / antiques / antique / museum / museum / mask / mask / statue / sculpture / Agalom / Armand Auxiètre / www.african-paris.com /
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David Norden http://users.telenet.be/african-shop/kerchache.htm
In a crucial moment for the world of Tribal Arts, Ana &Antonio Casanovas from Arte y Ritual and Alain Bovis Gallery present two consecutive exhibitions in Paris with a selection of masterworks from the Kerchache collection:
1.”HOMMAGE” June 16-July 22 2006 2. “NIGERIA” September 13th –October 20th 2006
“HOMAGE TO JACQUES KERCHACHE”
WHY?
The Quai Branly
We want to pay an HOMAGE to Jacques Kerchache and , in his name, give support to an important historical event : the opening of the Quai Branly,one of the most important museums in the world dedicated entirely to “les Arts Premiers”. Jacques was first appointed to asses the selection of art works for the “Pavillion des Sessions” in the Louvre Museum which was conceived as an antennae of the Quai Branly.He had a crucial role in the creation of this innovative museum and was an important member of the Acquisition Committee.
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african art / art africain / primitive art / art primitif / arts
premiers / art gallery / art tribal / tribal art / Afrique / Africa /
l'oeil et la main / galerie d'art premier / achat / vente / expertise /
expert / exposition / exhibition / collection / collectionneur / Paris
/ oeuvre / Verneuil / antiquités / antiquaire / musée / museum / masque
/ mask / statue / sculpture / Agalom / Armand Auxiètre /
www.african-paris.com / www.agalom.com
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P R E F A C E
In one of the chaos of rocks the most amazing of Africa, has a population of farmer-warriors who was one of the last of the French domain to lose its independence.
For most whites in West Africa, the Dogon are dangerous men, if not the most backward of the Federation. Ilspassent to practice human sacrifice and even to defend themselves better against all the outside influences that they live a difficult country. Some writers have told their small fears when supposedly daring excursions. From these legends and the pretext of revolts often due to misunderstandings, it has sometimes taken in exile of entire villages.
In short, the Dogon represent one of the finest examples of primitive savage and this opinion is shared by some black Muslims who, intellectually, are not better equipped than whites to appreciate those of their fellow faithful to ancestral traditions. Only officials who have assumed the heavy task of administering these men have learned to love them.
The author of this book and its many teammates attend the Dogon past fifteen years. They published the work of these men who are now the people's best-known French Sudan: The Souls of the Dogon (G. Dieterlen, 1941), The Currency (S. OF GANAY 1941), Masks (M. Griaule, 1938) have brought to scholarly evidence that blacks lived on complex ideas, but ordered, on systems of institutions and rituals where nothing is left to chance or whim. This work, already ten years ago, drew
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Tristan Tzara (born Samuel or Samy
Rosenstock, also known as S. Samyro; April 4 or April 16, 1896 –
December 25, 1963) was a Romanian and Frenchavant-garde poet, essayist and performance
artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic,
composer and film director, he was known best for being one of the founders and
central figures of the anti-establishmentDada movement. Under
the influence of Adrian Maniu, the adolescent
Tzara became interested in Symbolism and co-founded the magazine Simbolulwith Ion Vinea (with whom he also wrote experimental poetry) and painter Marcel
Janco. During World War I, after briefly collaborating on Vinea's Chemarea, he joined Janco in Switzerland.
There, Tzara's shows at the Cabaret Voltaire and Zunfthaus zur Waag, as well as his poetry and art
manifestos, became a main feature of early Dadaism. His work represented
Dada's nihilisticside, in contrast with the more moderate approach favored by Hugo Ball. After moving to Paris in 1919, Tzara, by then one of the "presidents of
Dada", joined the staff of Littérature magazine, which
marked the first step in the movement's evolution toward Surrealism.
He was involved in the major polemics which led to Dada's split, defending his
principles against André Breton and Francis
Picabia, and, in Romania, against the eclecticmodernism of
Vinea and Janco. This personal vision on art defined his Dadaist plays The Gas
Heart (1921) and Handkerchief of Clouds (1924). A
forerunner of automatist techniques, Tzara eventually
rallied with Breton's Surrealism, and, under its influence, wrote his
celebrated utopianpoem The Approximate Man. During the final part of his career, Tzara combined his humanist and anti-fascistperspective with a
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african art / art africain / primitive art / art primitif / arts
premiers / art gallery / art tribal / tribal art / l'oeil et la main /
galerie d'art premier / Agalom / Armand Auxiètre /
www.african-paris.com / www.agalom.com
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André Derain (10 June 1880 – 8 September
1954) was a French painter and co-founder of Fauvism with Henri
Matisse.
Biography
André Derain was born in 1880
in Chatou, Yvelines, Île-de-France, just outside Paris. In 1898,
while studying to be an engineer at the Académie Camillo, he attended painting
classes under Eugène Carrière, and there met Matisse.
In 1900, he met and shared a studio with Maurice de Vlaminck and began to paint his
first landscapes.
His studies were interrupted from 1901 to 1904 when he was conscriptedinto the French army. Following his release from service, Matisse persuaded
Derain's parents to allow him to abandon his engineering career and devote
himself solely to painting; subsequently Derain attended the Académie
Julian.Derain and Matisse worked together through the summer of 1905 in the Mediterraneanvillage of Collioureand later that year displayed their highly innovative paintings at the Salon
d'Automne. The vivid, unnatural colors led the critic Louis
Vauxcelles to derisively dub their works as les Fauves,
or "the wild beasts", marking the start of the Fauvist movement.
In March 1906, the noted art dealer Ambroise
Vollard sent Derain to London to compose a series of paintings with the
city as subject. In 30 paintings (29 of which are still extant), Derain put
forth a
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Marcel Griaule (Aisy-sur-Armançon, Yonne, 1898 - Paris, 1956) is a french ethnologist. After having passed several months in Abyssinia (1928 - 1929), he organised the crossing of Africa from west to east: it's the Dakar-Djibouti mission from
1931 to 1933 with Michel Leiris, André Schaeffner and other ethnologists, marking in the same time the start of the field ethnology. During this expedition, he studied the Dogon group, on which he consacred the majority of his researches.
Very linked to the dogon culture, he contributed to the development of the region by promoting the construction of an irrigation boom for the culture of onion and pepper in the region of Sangha.
One of his main contribution (related to ethnology) is having proved that the dogon cosmogony is at least as important as the western ones. However, he'll be very criticized for having under-estimate the western influence in the dogon astronomical knowledge. He has been one of the rare ethnologists to get traditional african funerals.
In 1941, he stood in for his former amharique professor Marcel Cohen, unauthorised to teach because of the anti-Semitic laws, at the INLCOV (School of the Eastern Languages). From 1943 to his death, he's professor at la Sorbonne (first chair of ethnology). He's also advisor of the French Union. From 1940, he was the general secretary of the Africanists Society.
He has
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