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The Brooklyn Museum

Education: Brooklyn Museum African Art and Community




Collection: African Art

Grades 6 through 12

About the Lesson

Welcome to the Brooklyn Museum. This lesson emphasizes the function of art in traditional African communities. Students will see objects associated with responsibility, kingship, education, and village life to discover how art is used as a tool to maintain important relationships.

The Museum lesson is designed to introduce students to looking at art. Through drawing, writing, questioning, and answering, students will explore art from various viewpoints and develop their observation skills.

Collaborative planning is the best way to ensure a valuable educational experience at the Museum. A museum educator, who will be your guide, will contact you soon, but if you would like to discuss the lesson now, you may contact the Youth Tour Coordinator at (718) 501-6221.

Suggested Pre-Visit Activities

While the Museum learning experience is based on observation, a pre-visit activity introducing vocabulary, history, or background information greatly enhances a class trip. Included below are a few suggestions you may use to prepare students for a Museum visit. If you have used other pre-visit activities or resources to prepare students for a visit to the Museum, please share them with us.

1. Using a map of Africa, point out the following sub-Saharan countries that will be emphasized on your Museum visit. Explain that Africa is a large continent made up of many different countries, different geographical environments, diverse peoples, and, thus, many different kinds of communities.

Discuss how African artists, like many artists, often use local materials in their work. Discuss the physical characteristics of each country listed above and brainstorm about what natural resources are available in each place.

2. Ask the students to define community (see vocabulary). Discuss the various relationships found within the students’ own communities. Why are they important? Examples to emphasize:


3. Discuss objects we associate with the following ceremonies or celebrations. How do they relate to communities?

Vocabulary

We encourage you to introduce the following vocabulary words, either independently or in conjunction with the activities above.

Relationship
the state of being connected or related

Community
a group of people that shares a common history or common interests

Ancestry
line of descent

Ceremony
a formal act as prescribed by ritual, protocol, or convention

Sculpture
a work of art made by carving, modeling, or welding

For Educators

Blier, Suzanne P. The Royal Arts of Africa: The Majesty of Form. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1998.
This book discusses the royal arts of West and Central Africa. The Brooklyn Museum has royal art made by many of the peoples covered in the text, such as the Benin, the Yoruba, the Ashanti, and the Kuba. The book also includes a timeline, glossary, bibliography, and index.

Brooklyn Museum. The Arts of Africa, 1997.
This teacher packet includes slides and detailed descriptions of ten objects in the Brooklyn Museum’s Arts of Africa collection. It also contains a map of Africa and a selection of myths and stories. The bibliography, selection of stories, and suggested questions are especially useful for classroom teachers. Available for purchase.

Brooklyn Museum. Brooklyn Museum of Art. Co-published with Scala Books, 1997.
This catalogue includes images of key objects from the Museum’s collections. Seventeen objects are discussed from the Arts of Africa collection, including the ones that are frequently taught in the “Art and Community” lesson.

Dowling, Katie. Arts of Africa. The Art Institute of Chicago: Teacher Programs, Department of Museum Education, 1998.
This teacher packet includes 20 slides, a timeline, glossary, pronunciation guide, bibliographies for teachers and children, maps, a huge poster-size map and suggested discussion topics and activities. The art is discussed stylistically, geographically, and thematically.

Tom Phillips, ed., Africa: The Art of a Continent. New York: Prestel, 1999.
This book is a great quick reference with 1,000 color photos of objects (arranged geographically), each accompanied by a concise, informative text.

Saccardi, Marianne. Art in Story: Teaching Art History to Elementary School Children. North Haven, CT.: The Shoe String Press, Inc., 1997.
The book’s introduction suggests successful ways to teach a class about art and art history. Twenty chapters cover artistic styles from prehistory to the present. The Arts of Africa section contains a few pages of background information and two sample lessons, one focusing on African masks and the other on African sculpture.

For Students

Angelou, Maya and Margaret Courtney-Clarke. Kofi and His Magic. New York: Clarkson Potter Publishers, 1996.
This book tells the story of a boy named Kofi from the town of Bonwire, Ghana, known worldwide for its beautifully woven Kente cloth. Join Kofi as he uses magic powered by his imagination to see different people and awe-inspiring sights in neighboring towns.

Ayo, Yvonne. Eyewitness Books: Africa. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995.
The format of this book is similar to most Eyewitness books, with photos, illustrations, and diagrams accompanied by brief explanations and definitions. This book covers the geography, history, arts, and daily life of Africa from ancient times to the present.

Leo Dillon, Diane Dillon, and Margaret W. Musgrove. Ashanti to Zulu: African Traditions. Dial Books, 1977.
An ABC book of sorts—each page is devoted to an African tribe that corresponds with a letter of the alphabet (Ashanti, Baule, etc.) The information is presented in short paragraphs, allowing the book to be used as a reference tool and as a picture book. The accompanying illustrations are beautiful (the book won the Caldecott medal in 1977) and enlightening, providing additional information about customs, dress, ornament, and daily activities.

FACES the Magazine about People: The Yoruba People of Nigeria and Beyond. Cobblestone Press, Volume 12, Number 1, September 1995.
Published with the cooperation of the American Museum of Natural History, this magazine has received both the EdPress 1991 Distinguished Achievement Award and the Parents’ Choice Magazine Award. This issue explores the art, stories, daily life, and culture of the Yoruba people of Nigeria. It includes a bibliography and list of Web resources as well as suggested activities.

Thompson, Peggy. The Nine-Ton Cat: Behind the Scenes at an Art Museum. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1997.
The Nine-Ton Cat takes readers behind the staff-only doors at a museum—in this case, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The duties of art handlers, curators, guards, conservators, and other museum employees are defined, as are the important behind-the-scenes activities that make a museum safe for artworks and pleasant for visitors.

Brooklyn Museum Family Guide: African Galleries
Brooklyn Museum Family Guide: African Masks
These family guides to the Arts of Africa galleries at the Brooklyn Museum introduce young people and their adult companions to several artworks on view. A variety of activities in the guide enable visitors to look closely, draw, and write about the art objects.

Multimedia

African Odyssey Interactive
This site provides information on African art events around the world, online art, and educational resources. The K–12 Arts and Teaching Resources section is particularly useful, offering a glossary, bibliography, stories, and lesson plans.

Art and Life in Africa Online
This site contains maps and information on the history, art, economy, and political systems of the different countries and peoples of Africa. This site also contains a link to the African Art Database of the University of Iowa Museum of Art.

Odyssey Online
Intended for teachers and students, this site includes a mapping activity and suggested Web sites (linked and annotated). It is divided into five categories: People; Ritual & Ceremony; Daily Life; Death & Burial; and Communication.

Teacher’s Guide to African Art
From the Education Department of the de Young Museum in San Francisco, this site is an excellent resource for teaching about African art. The guide is divided into four sections: “What should I know about Africa?”; “How was this object used?”; “Why does the object look the way it does?”; and “Is this object traditional or modern?” The images are well chosen and the text is clear and substantial without being overwhelming. Each section is accompanied by vocabulary terms and suggested projects. There is also a recommended bibliography for teachers and students.

Thank you for planning a visit to the Brooklyn Museum.

We look forward to seeing you.