INFLUENCE OF AFRICA
Frank McEwen
apresentaçao do catálogo de
Exhitions to be held on the occasion of the FIRST CONGRESS OF AFRICAN CULTURE
National Gallery Salisbury / August 1 — September 30, 1962
INFLUENCE OF AFRICA
THERE HAVE BEEN MANY, lN RECENT YEARS ALMOST TOO MANY, GREAT EXHIBITIONS OF AFRICAN ART lN EUROPE AND lN AMERICA. BEGINNING lN THE 1910'S AND EARLY 20'S, THEY HAVE NOW BECOME FREQUENT NECESSITIES, ESPECIALLY lN AMERICA.
IT IS THEREFORE HIGH TIME THAT AFRICAN ART WERE SHOWN MORE OFTEN lN AFRICA, AND RECLAIMED CULTURALLY BY ITS CREATORS.
WE HAVE BEEN ASKED WHY WE HOLD A FESTIVAL OF AFRICAN ART lN RHODESIA, WHERE IT IS LlTTLE KNOWN —BUT SURELY THIS IS WHERE IT IS MOST NEEDED.
SOME WORTHIES WILL SAY "AFRICAN ART WAS NOT MADE AS 'ART' ". FOR THAT MATTER, NEITHER WERE ROMANESQUE CHURCHES NOR GOTHIC CATHEDRALS. LlKE AFRICAN ART THEY WERE CREATED WITH MAGICAL, MYSTICAL KNOWLEDGE AND ASPIRATION. WHEN THAT MYSTICISM WAS OVERWHELMED BY NEWER, LESSER THINGS THE REMAINING EFFIGIES BECAME 'ART' — ART FOR URGING, EXCITING, PROVOKING, EXPRESSING, INSPIRING .....
WE ARE TOLD THAT DR. LlVINGSTONE 'DISCOVERED' THE VICTORIA FALLS AND THAT SOMEBODY ELSE, A THOUSAND YEARS AFTER PTOLOMEY CHARTERED THEM, 'DISCOVERED' THE SOURCES OF THE NILE. BUT WHO 'DISCOVERED' THAT AFRICAN ART WAS 'ART'? BEFORE THE EXPRESSIONISTS, BEFORE THE PICASSO GROUP, AND LONG BEFORE THE MOVEMENTS OF INDEPENDENCE, A VERTIGINOUS FASCINATION FOR IT SPREAD OVER EUROPE. IT WAS LlKE PATTERING RAIN, ANNOUNCING A VIOLENT SQUALL. THE SQUALL BLEW UP AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY WHILE AFRICA WAS STILL lN THE GREAT SLEEP AND SPANISH, FRENCH AND GERMAN ARTISTS —EXPLORERS lN AESTHETtCS — WERE BLOWN BEFORE ITS BLAST LlKE FULL-RIGGED SHIPS UNDER BARE POLES.
NOT YET QUITE SPENT, lN 60 YEARS, THE SQUALL HAS CHANGED THE FACE OF WESTERN ART. VITAL, UNWRITTEN MUSIC IS ALSO BEING RE-DISCOVERED BY THE OCCIDENT AND THE IMPELLlNG FORCE OF JOY lN DANCE. GONE ARE THE NAUSEATING NUDES A LA MANIERE DE BOUGUEREAU, GOING IS THE SICKLY MUSIC. THIS ESCAPE TO NEW REALlTIES WAS ONLY HERALDED BY THE FANTASTIC CEZANNE. THEN INTO THE ROBOT-MINDED WORLD BLEW A HALF-ROBOT, HALF-MAGICAL ART CONSCIOUS OF AFRICA. BUT AS THE STORM ABATES WESTERN ART ITSELF IS PETERING OUT. QUANTITY DESTROYS QUALlTY lN AN ODIOUS GAME OF MONEY AND RIGGED ART FAIRS.
THE HARD AFRICAN SKY IS WHERE THE STORM CAME FROM. ITS BLAST STRUCK SUGARY AESTHETICS AND, AT THE SAME TIME, ANOTHER VISION OF VIRILE CREATIONS IS CLOSE AT HAND — A NEW, NON-TRADITIONAL, AFRICAN ART. AGAIN, IT MAY LACK lN LATIN SOFTNESS. IT IS NOW CONCERNED WITH THE REALlTIES OF LlFE AND DEATH — WITH THE DRUM BEAT OF A VAST HEART WHERE WARM BLOOD FLOWS AND WISER SPIRITS BECOME INCARNATE.
AFRICA IS THAT WELCOME OTHER EXTREME TO OUR UNRELAXED INQUIETUDE AND THE ROBOT 'WELFARE' STATE. SHE EXISTS FOR RHYTHM AND IMAGINATION, EXPRESSION, ECSTASY AND TRANCE. SHE EXISTS FOR THE KNOWLEDGE THAT DE-HUMANISING EDUCATION HAS EFFACED lN US AND WHICH MECHANISATION_ MAY TEMPORARILY OBSCURE lN AFRICA. AFRICA IS THE WIDE EXCHANGING GROUND WHERE OUR VAUNTED ADVANTAGES MIX WITH CONCEPTIONS OF ART, RELlGION AND LlFE WHICH ARE, TO US, UNBELlEVABLY VARIED AND OBSCURE. BUT lN THIS VIGOROUS ENCOUNTER WHICH, LlKE ALL OTHER HUMAN DEVELOPMENTS, WAS PRECEDED BY MOVEMENTS lN ART A WORLD OF HASTE COMES TO LEARN FROM ANCIENT AFRICA, THINGS IT FORGOT!
WITH INCREDIBLE VARIATIONS lN STYLE AND MEANING TO AN EXTENT UNKNOWN ELSEWHERE lN HISTORY, AFRICAN ART IS MAINLY EXPRESSIONISTIC. HERE EXPRESSIONISM AND SURREALlSM SERVE HALLUCINATORY INTENSITIES OF SHOCK AND FEELlNG. BUT ALL STYLES WERE ACTIVE lN AFRICA FROM THE LINEAR PURISM OF THE PORPIANONG OR THE OGBOM HEAD-DRESS TO THE SPIRITUALLY ILLUMINATED REALlSM OF IFE. WHEN CONFRONTED WITH THIS 14TH CENTURY IFE WORK, SO WELL INFUSED WITH LlFE, THE UNFAMILlAR EUROPEAN, HIDEBOUND BY GRECO-VICTORIAN ACADEMISM IS FORCED TO 'SEE' SOME 'GOOD' lN AFRICAN ART! BUT MANY SOPHISTICATED MODERN AFRICANS, DIVORCED FROM THEIR DYNAMIC PAST, MISUNDERSTAND EQUALLY WELL; CHOCOLATE-BOX AND AIRPORT ART SENTIMENTALlTY ABOUNDS WHILE THEY EVEN INDULGE lN ROCK AN' ROLL! SOME NEWLY INDEPENDENT AFRICAN NATIONS, BURSTING WITH MUSICAL LlFE OF THEIR OWN, HAVE GONE SO FAR AFIELD AS TO HAVE THEIR NATIONAL ANTHEMS COMPOSED lN EUROPE!
AS TIME ADVANCES RAPIDLY, SIGNIFICANT FACTS OF THE CONTROVERSIAL AFRICAN AFFAIR WILL BECOME APPARENT. IT WILL BE SEEN THAT, lN THE 20TH CENTURY, AFRICA WAS THE FIRST TO MAKE HER CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE WESTERN HUMANITIES - TO ART, FAITH, MUSIC, ENTHUSIASM. HER DONATIONS TO THE WEST WERE, HOWEVER, DISCREETLY, EVEN UNCONSCIOUSLY MADE. THEY WERE NOT PATERNALlSTICALLY PROCLAIMED BY MISSIONARlES, FREEDOM-RIDERS OR PEACE CORPS! THERE WAS NO CASHING lN, HURRIEDLY, ON ALL THAT WAS BEING DONE FOR THE 'BACKWARD', 'UNDER-DEVELOPED', CONTINENTS OF EUROPE AND AMERICA!
THESE GIFTS FROM AFRICA CAME BEFORE THOSE OBVIOUS ONES - GIFTS MADE BY US lN RETURN FOR VALUABLE MEDICINES AND MACHINERY OR SUCH SOUL-DESTROYING INTRUSIONS AS SPUTNIKS, PORTABLE RADIOS, JET TRAVEL TO NOWHERE, NOT TO MENTION THE ABUSIVE USE OF MOVIES AND TELEVISION!
AND NOW TO SUM UP, AS THE PENDULUM OF OPINION SWINGS, THIS GROUP OF EXHIBITIONS OF AFRICAN, NEO-AFRICAN AND NEW AFRICAN ART IS MADE TO PROVE TO ALL PEOPLES ALlKE, FOR JOY AND FOR MEDITATION, SOME LESSER KNOWN FACTS.
BUT THE STRANGE AFFAIR OF 'GIVE' AND 'TAKE' HAS SEVERAL FACETS. ONE IS OUR PRESENT CONCERN - TO SHOW WHAT EUROPEAN GENIUS OWES TO THE ANCIENT GENIUS OF AFRICA.
FRANK McEWEN.
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(2010) "A exposição paralela ao congresso foi uma muito vasta mostra de arte africana, a maior de sempre até à data, segundo a Time Magazine (28-09-1962). Iniciava-se com as culturas que precederam a chegada da influência europeia e continuava até à “arte africana não tradicional dos anos 60” (The London Times, 12-08-1962). À época, enquanto “para muitos colonos brancos a arte africana era vista como uma treta (“a mumbo-jumbo sort of thing”), prova da ausência de instintos culturais nos nativos africanos”, o Rhodesia Herald dizia que nada mais se via que “crueldade, primitivismo e selvajaria”. McEwen pretendia mostrar que “todo o movimento moderno na arte ocidental tem uma dívida para com a África primitiva”, já que são “muito poucos os artistas de estilo contemporâneo que não possuem alguma influência de África, bem digerida mas evidente” (Time Magazine N6). Barr comprou então as primeiras obras africanas modernas para o MoMA. P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm; }A:link { }
6 Citado em Adele Aldridge, “Frank McEwen: Rhodes National Gallery in Salisbury, Rhodesia”, 2007, http://www.adeleart.com/McEwen/Articles.html
Frank McEwen showing Queen Elizabeth the opening for The Rhodes National Gallery in Salisbury, Rhodesia, 1956
"Malangatana é referido na cronologia do Met e em outras fontes como um dos artistas africanos participantes no Congresso (ao lado de Vincent Kofi, do Gana, e do nigeriano Ben Enwonwu). Trata-se de um equívoco, já que apenas as suas obras estiveram presentes na representação de Moçambique enviada por Pancho Guedes, ao lado de Abdias Muhlanga / no cat. Abdias Júlio Muchanga / – era uma revelação recente, cujo itinerário posterior foi muito atribulado – e do esquecido Metine Macie, mas também de Augusto Naftal e Alberto Mati, dois artistas muito jovens sem qualquer aprendizagem formal a quem Pancho comprava regularmente desenhos. É agora a primeira vez que se pode rever parte significativa dessa representação." (Cat. 2010)
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