Description

-Features 78 exceptional works - many never published before - drawn from the Cleveland Museum of Art, the National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C., and a large number of American private collections

The arts of southeast Africa embrace astounding diversity and limitless inventiveness in materials, forms, and styles. Small and portable in nature - snuff containers, pipes, headrests, staffs, clubs, beer vessels, beaded garments - they were created by semi-nomadic pastoral peoples and primarily intended for daily use. Whether figurative or abstract, carved out of wood, ivory, or horn, or made of cloth, glass beads, or clay, most of these works were much more than exquisitely designed functional objects. Some signaled status, gender, or age; others served as symbolic intermediaries between the world of humans and the realm of the ancestors.