Category Archives: Arts of Africa

A Recent Donation from Camille and Luther Clark

The Brooklyn Museum Library collection has recently been enriched with the donation of several rare items of African American art given by Camille and Luther Clark. This donation is one of many in response to the Museum’s collecting initiative that … Continue reading

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African Innovations Now Open!

After many months of object review, checklist creation, cross-departmental consultation, budgeting, conservation, design, research, writing, photography, editing, construction, painting, installation, and lighting, I am pleased to report that African Innovations is now open to the public. Our ace Technology team … Continue reading

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Elvis is in the building

Elvis is at the Brooklyn Museum and not where you’d expect to find him—in the new installation of the Museum’s African galleries, African Innovations. Brooklyn’s Elvis is a ceremonial mask of the Nyau Society of the Chewa peoples, who reside … Continue reading

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Please Touch

Textiles are a crucial element to the story I wanted to tell in African Innovations. Immensely varied in media, form, content and use, textile arts are found in every corner of the continent. They have played important roles in the … Continue reading

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Installation in Progress

One of the many adaptations that moving the African collection into the South Gallery on the First Floor has required has been adjusting to a space that is both smaller and considerably more open than the old Arts of Africa … Continue reading

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Arts of Africa Gives Way to African Innovations

Recent visitors to the museum may have noticed some increasingly dramatic changes to the first floor—first, a new series of walls began to rise in the South Gallery space beyond the Great Hall. As of this week, the African galleries … Continue reading

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Brooklyn’s Semi-Cameo on Treme—Delving Deeper

Thinking further about our unexpected cameo on Treme the other week, there are even further connections to our own collection that can be made to the Loma mask highlighted on the show. Despite the considerable geographic distance between them, the … Continue reading

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“They got that from us” Brooklyn’s Semi-Cameo on Treme

I was recently alerted by Jenny and Shelley that our African collection got an unexpected shout out on a recent episode of Treme, HBO’s drama about post-Katrina New Orleans. Sure enough, in an episode entitled “What is New Orleans?” that … Continue reading

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Photo Survey of Historic African Collection

Careful watchers of the museum’s online image collections may have noticed some large new batches of African works begin to pop up over the last month. This summer, with the help of Connie Jang, an intern with the Digital Collections … Continue reading

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Lulua Mother and Child Figure Returns to View

One of the African collection’s most famous, signature objects has recently returned to view in the first-floor galleries, after well over a year’s worth of travel around the country. Lulua. Mother with Child (Luphinga Lua Limpe), 19th century. Wood, 14 … Continue reading

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Elephant Mask on View

Once permanent installations are set into place, the opportunities for placing previously unseen works on view are rather rare—even with a collection as deep (with over 6000 objects) and well-regarded as Brooklyn’s collection of African art (ranked among the most … Continue reading

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