Harn Museum Florida
Samuel P. Harn Museum of ArtS.W. 34th Street and Hull Road
Gainesville
Florida 32611-2700
The Harn Museum
is located on the University of Florida campus at the UF Cultural Plaza.
Mfengu
people, South AfricaYoung Matron's DressLate 19th-early 20th century Cloth,
leather, beads, metal From skirt bottom to top of crown: 63 in.
2003.35
Museum purchase, funds provided by the Caroline Julier and James G. Richardson
Art Acquisition Fund
Harn Museum presents "Sense, Style, Presence: African
Arts of Personal Adornment" on display through June 2006. Harn Museum of
Art.
Sense, Style, Presence: African Arts of Personal Adornment
November 09, 2004 - June 30, 2006
African Arts of Personal Adornment is
drawn from the Harn Museum collection and explores a range of African objects
and modes of personal adornment, in both everyday and ritual contexts.
“Adorn” refers to what is used for two essential approaches to dressing the
body. It includes both extending the dimensions, color and textures of the body
through garments, jewelry and other accoutrements, and modifying the shape and
texture of the skin and hair.
African Arts of Personal Adornment is
curated by Susan Cooksey, Associate Curator of African Art, and is accompanied
by a catalog. This exhibition is made possible by the Museum Loan Network–a
program funded and initiated by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and
the Pew Charitable Trusts, and administered by MIT’s Office of the Arts with
additional support provided by the Harn Program Endowment.
related BEYOND
DESIRE at MoMu museum
Antwerpen. Desire, attitude and styling in
African and Western cultures.
Harn Museum permanent
collection
The permanent
collection contains an impressive concentration of West African art with a
particular focus on art from Nigeria, notably from Yoruba, Igbo and Edo
peoples, including works from the Court of Benin. Other West African groups
represented include the Akan of Ghana; the Vai and Mende of Sierra Leone and
Liberia; and the Mossi, Bwa, Lobi, Nunuma and Winiama from Burkina Faso. Dan
and Mano masks and costumes from Liberia, and Senufo and Baule masks and
figures from Côte d'Ivoire are also well represented in the collection.
The
Central African collection includes objects from Cameroon, Gabon, the Democratic
Republic of Congo and Angola. Representation of Central African art was recently
enhanced by the acquisition of a Beembe ancestor figure, a Yaka diviner's slit
gong and a group of Ituri rainforest barkcloths from the Democratic Republic of
Congo, as well as a Kota reliquary figure from Gabon. The South African
collection includes Ndbele beaded garments and a variety of Zulu items of
personal adornment, including an extensive collection of Zulu earplugs, a
married woman's hat made of basketry, human hair and beaded garments. The
collection also features a group of handsome Zulu beer vessels.
East
African objects include Makonde masks and a collection of Ethiopian secular and
Orthodox Christian art from the 12th to the 20th century, including processional
crosses, icons, handheld crosses, paintings, illuminated manuscripts, healing
scrolls and garments. To complement this collection, the museum has recently
commissioned a suite of paintings by contemporary Ethiopian church painter, Qes
Adamu Tesfaw.
