Enigmas of the crossroad : vision and light. Reception and distribution of African Art

              Enigmas of the crossroad:
Vision and Light, Reception
and distribution of African Art *
ERY CÁMARA
To begin with, I want to express my gra-titude
to the authoríties that have invited me
to particípate in this debate. The occasion
seems similar to the kind of joyful celebra-tion
expeñenced by Afrícans upon the reen-counter
with their talent and genius during
the artistic manifestations that took place at
the first World Festival of the African Arts,
in Dakar in 1966.
The Musée Dynamique held during this
occasion an exhibition organizaed by Iba
N'Daye: Teadeacies and Confroatations, the
Contemporary Arts. This event stimulated,
among others, one of the most Senegalese vir-tues:
Teranga, hospitality or availability, and
especially, utter probity and generosity when
consideting the master works of African Art.
Art, is indeed, the image of the soul. As a
path to essence, it leads>man most intimately
to the fuUilment of love. For this reason, the
reception of a work of art in our traditional
societies was put to the test within a symbo-lically
determined ritual. Poetry, dance and
music fused in a law that belonged to that
moment of communion with the invisible.
Nothing would be more true than this inner
trembling and the harmonious reaction that
stenuned from the idenity that symbolic ima­ges
in initiation rites or any other vitalistic
celebration possess and provoke. Art and edu-cation
reciprocally strengthened the commu-nity's
well-being.
I wouldn't mind if the painter, the resto-rer,
the museum expert all had their say, but
I'm a son of this earth, and Tve always felt
the need to be myself. To broach the subject
of the reception given to African Art within
its context abroad enables us to evalúate the
State of preservation of its virtues. It is per-tinent
to remember, inspite of the bad taste
• This lecture was given as part of the debates
that took place in Dakar, Sene¿ü, on the occasion
of Dak'Art 92.
it leaves most historians, that the genocides
and the colonialism that have sadly disrupted
Africa's history, have simultaneously determi­ned
certain of our reactions towards our cul­tural
valúes.
The alteration of our territory by these tra-gic
invasions, to which we must add the for-ceful
influence of foreign religjons and certain
contríbutíons of industrial civilization have
had great repercussions on our sensibility.
They are facts that have perturbed and vexed
the development of African Arts. However,
and I don't say it in vain, none of these
manifestations will lose neither the spirit ñor
the strengh of their oríginality.
Our aspiration to independence reveáis one
of the stages of this history; regained free-dom
to choose the most adequate means
that secare the best continuity for our tradi-tions
and our heritage. This privilege confers
on US the responsability, of protecting and
increasing these valúes, for future generations.
To carry a bit further and humbly, like in a
caravan, the memory of those we love, pas-sing
on to the new generation that eventual
responsibility; that's what we can all achieve
united.
To preserve this heritage means to prepare
the way for its reception, its distribution and
its appreciation. To measure the capacity of
its present Information and the initiative of
host institutions, foments simultaneously, rat-her
than a change, progress based on truth
and precisión, making all aggression futile
and impotent. To the extent that we are able
to deploy our sttength with greater efficiency,
this recovery of the vigour and the resistence
of our art to any manipulation by speculative
phantasy will represent a transformation and
an innovation, and the most sane behaviour.
The renovation or the revolution of creativity
traces the history of the art work, of the ori-gin
of its changes and its incombustible sur-prises.
This dynamic encourages criticism oriented
to stimulation and thought armed with mani-fold
criteria of the perception of the art work
as common property and not as the exclusive
right of a minority. To conserve our cultural
legacy is to revitalize it in the memory and
in the heart of people. We fínd traditional
references in the collective subconscious that
appear as concems to be divulged to the new
generations. In 1945, referríng to the state of
conservation of our heritage, Léopold Sedar
Senghor said:
"Oíd África is dying. Customs and lan-guage
are being transformed at incredible
speed. There's only enough time left to pho-tograph
its face at this moment, a visage that
stül mirrors its etemal features. Tomorrow
shall be too late."
Imagine my astonishement when reading in
the catalogue of the exhibition África
Today:
"Being African doesn't imply the fact of
belonging to any community."
Actually, in Senegalese society, animist,
moslem and christian traditions coexist. The
racial plurality that characterizes our society,
is accelerated daily by the annexation derived
from economic and technological progress.
To detect the imprint of its impact on the
situation, public opinión and adopted beha­viour
gives US a far more precise approach'to
the cultural phenomenom. Under this condi-tion
of economic sub-development, we can,
without generalizing, imagine the obstacles
cleared by africans responsible for effecting a
fairer and more rational reevaluation of our
heritage than the one conducted by ethno-graphy
at the service of colonialism, or the
black slave trade and the prime products deri­ved
from it that favoiu«d the industrial revo­lution.
AA-
Though History's time leads our way, to
sitúate the beginnings of contemporary Afri-can
art withiu the framework of indepen-dence
may not be very accurate. For us,
ancestois are contemporary. They have never
gone, they keep guard over their descendents.
Sighs, exiled as we are (the poet sings), they
refuse to die. Their art is a necessary refe-rence
in History, though encyclopedias of uni­versal
art, don't find it convenient, when refe-rring
to their qualities, to justify the ambi-guous
pretext of Arthur de Gobineau in his
book: Essay on the inequality of the human
races, conceming the "superlative degree of
the sensual faculty the negro is endowed with
and without which no art can possibly exist".
Yet, he also stated, "he required the help of
the white race to promote its valúes". His­tory
took no time in proving the contrary.
Our art has proved it, surviving as a vehicle
for memory, sensibility and the human ima-gination.
Therein lies its oríginahty.
With its rhythm, its charm, its indomitable
power of fascination and its classical forcé,
negro art triggered off the fascination of wes-tern
artists with a new aesthetics of surpri-sing
spontaneity if compared with the mecha-nical
systematizations of academies and with
a clarity that somehow acted as a redeeming
spell for art and artists trapped in one way
or another by positivism, and later by mate-rialism.
This perturbing charm, though fre-quently
distorted by certain isolated and ill-adapted
formulas, rather than spirítual inspi-ration,
remains as a strange, curious object
for the absent minded. See what Michel Lei-ris
says about Cubism:
"...the suppoTt these works could give to
european artists in search of new techniques.
Fauvists like Vlaminck and Derain (in fact,
Picasso attributes the true discovery of
cubism to Vlaminck), anxious to return to
the origins observed with sympathy, popular
or primitive works which moved away from
the greco-roman ideáis extant since the
Renaissance, and apparently created with
utter innocence seemed examples of an art
devoid of sophistication."
We regret the fact that today the most
beautiful examples of these works are to be
found in museums and coUections far away
from US. The scarcity of Information about
the knowledge they cumulatively possess, con-demn
the few surviving pieces to the icono-clasm
of the invaders, to being the constant
prey of poaching, to unlimited commercial
speculation or irreverent imitation that vilifies
the appearance of airports with tourist galle-ríes
in África and throughout the world. We
might think we were in the heat of discovery,
when masterpieces in gold by original crea-tors
were melted down into lingots in order
to feed mercantilism. Pnce substitutes all
valúes and becomes economic and political
power. The works, labelled and distríbuted in
commercial and market forums. The sanctua-ries
of desecration and its priests are able to
fmd with the same stiategic energy appíied to
all International relations a price for everyt-hing.
All of this represents a serious handi-cap
for US Africans. I imagine it is the same
type of handicap that most of our masterpie­ces
suffer condemned to oblivion in crates, in
inadequate repositories, in museums jampac-ked
with objects or in offices. The absence of
African Art in the academic programmes of
schopls is simultaneously mirrored by the
inefficiency of the teaching models used. The
clinical history or the diagnosis of these
works analized in terms of the femenine or
the masculine, the organic and the inorganic,
the tangible and the intangible, point out just
how much work has to be done in order to
secure their integrity and to free the effi-ciency
they contain.
In the preface to the book of the Dakar
Museum, André Malraux says that we
wouldn't know how to find the state of
grace, that enabled the hands and the eyes of
the traditional artist to engender the forms
and the colours of the invisible. Our search,
far from imitating the ancestors, is made evi-dent
by the foUowing quotation by Senghor
from the same book:
"It is still impossible, contemplating to the
point of hallucinatioa, the masterpieces of
African Art at the Dakar Museum, to reen-counter
not only the forms and colours of
the ancient artists, but their style that flows
from the very source of négritude. As this is
not impaired, we only have to make an iimer
return, to sink to the depths of our soul, till
we reach the place where the underground
river flows beneath the saad, so that visión
emerges and the rhythm of the Kingdom of
Childhood begins to beat. That's the advice
we've given our young artists. "Visit fre-quently
our Museum", /Ve told them,
"Behold these violent and puré forms until
they possess you obsessively. This is the idea
with which we've built, on the west coast of
Dakar, facing the Atlantic ocean, a modem
museum of Negro-African art where the
more than 26.000 pieces that are still packed
will fínd a place."
Museography in this part of the world is
far less eloquent than the Master of Words.
We regret that the modem museum has
remained a project. The coUections of the
contemporary cultural heritage similarly share
the same conditions of conservation. The fai-lure,
or the frustration of this kind of invest-ments,
even in the case of a staff devoted to
the conservation of cultural heritage, (estáte
or chattels), or to its continuity, approaches
the turbulent image of the present that
informs and illustrates most of the articles of
the Anthologie des Arts Plastiques Contem-porains
au Sénégal.
Furthermore, certain notorious contradic-tions
of the cultural politics within the con-text
of Senegalese artistic reality are lengthily
debated in two articles of the exhibition's
catalogue: África explores: 20th Ceatury Afri­can
Art, organized by the Centre for African
Art and the New York Museum of Contem­porary
Art, and The Ofñcial History, by
Susan Vogel, and Négritude: Between Mask
and Flag, Senegalese cultural ideology and
the École de Dakar. Later on I'd like to
come back to these articles.
As far as the Musée Dynamique goes,
where our contemporary art meets masterpie­ces
of twentieth century art like internatío-nally
released credit notes, the strange func-tion
that currently distorts it, reduces the
space symbolically prepared for stimulating
processes of familiaiization, attendance, adap-tation
and the deference we demand for our
ancient or contemporary art. This monument
is awaiting the restoration of its purpose and
style. It hasn't been adapted to our needs;
thus the silence that has condemned it to its
present circumstances. The study of the reac-tions
of Senegalese people to works of art is •
pending so that we can effect a better museo-graphic
reform of our heritage.
The lack of competent staff in the field of
conservation, restoration of cultural heritage
and museology makes the situation for prí­vate
and State coUections more difficult. We
have examples that explain the absence of
investigating the state of our art's conserva­tion
and our aesthetic education in schools
and universities. There aren't national or
regional museums that house permanent or
temporary exhibitions of our ancestors' mas­terpieces.
The scarce bibliographical referen-ees
published by africans to protect the
wealth of perpetuable traditions which trans-mitted
art from one generation to another,
monographical studies with illustrations of
the Ufe and work of the artist that distin-guish
our history, make these less known at
home than in other places.
Exhibitions organized by the state, artists
and prívate galleties, though surprisingly cove-red
by the press, avoiding the Umitations of
type-casting, are received indifferently by the
pubUc and the critics. Criticism that is assem-bled
by itinerant exhibitions organized by the
state abroad, only reach us through the fUter
of sensationalist press communiqués. Abroad,
in art history books, catalogues and exhibi­tions,
there is hard críticism of cultural poli-cies
and the contemporary arts in África.
For André Magnin, curator of the itine­rant
exhibition África Today, his adventures
are resumed in this depiction of the continent
at the present moment:
"...When politicians lament profusely the
loss of African identity, due to colonial and
neo-colonial oppresion, there's a lack ofini-tiatives
and money to set up permanent
coUections."
Susan Vogel, curator of the exhibition
África explores: 20th century African Art and
director of the New York Centre for African
Art where it was held, states:
"A serious problem, thougfi less for artists
and offícials, is the absence of compromised
críticism. Artists in África, are limited by a
lack of perspective in their work. They
hardly see any art works produced by artists
outside their environment. The official infra-structure
is monolithical and unavoidable,
and it dispenses indiscriminate support, that
counts on critical reception in the press that
wallows in ílattery. The only opinions avai-lable
to artists, come vía fríends or teachers,
and artist associations where críticism is limi-ted
by poUtics and closeness. Isolation, frus-tration
and complacency are the gravest pro-blems
that beset African International Art."
Taking the opinión of these specialist
entrusted with the task of contextualizing the
coUections of African Art, we can imagine
easily how the foreign pubhc is ideologically
oriented towards knowledge of our art, our
artists and our cultural politics. These cata­logues
progressively become books of increa-sing
importance, by the careful selection of
author and edition, that sometimes are better
than the exhibition. They are sacralized by
experts, specialists and leading intellectuals
(fortunately some fine sensibilities appear
among them), for the collector and the spe­cialist.
The production of spectacles for the
profane is abundant in supermarkets and
librarles.
The impact of the deficiencies and absen-ces
recorded as interferences in the develop-ment
of the artistic education of artists, stu-dents
and public, is made evident by the lack
of a constant organized and institutionalized
criticism that includes different manifold cri-teria
of approximation to black African art
and the aesthetics that gives it substance.
This blank gives rise to the following westem
statements on the panorama of African Art
today:
"...With the exception of rare examples, we
don 't fínd there museums, coUections, galle-ríes
or art críticism...". "...The arríval of the
europeans was necessary to give painting the
standing it required". "I searched for art and
artists. This explora tion was somewhat ill-fated.
I had to observe, to what extent, art
(or should I say magic), had been uprooted
from the very central and existential place
that it had once occupied in the Ufe of Afri­can
man. Some tried to keep up my expec-tations,
in... For even in the most sophistica-ted
circles, art appeared as an alibi to con-ceal
the loss of ethnic personality, cultural
ignorance or indifference. Not only conside-ration
but even respect were missing for art."
"This also carríes, however paradoxical it
may seem, an implied danger. The main
client of the Third World's new art is stiU
the First World, and this sitúa tion dated
from decolonization. From the time when
freedom of movement had no boundaríes. It
is European travellers, north Americans and
Japanese, or foreigners with temporary con­traéis,
who at the most spend only a brief
time, that determine the African artistic mar-ket.
A series of factors, like the lack of cul­ture
poverty, the absence of a large educated
middle-class and tendency of cultured people
to imítate European models and to organize
consummerism round the products of indus­trial
society (especially cars, electrical goods,
sports wear and luxury upholstered furni-ture),
have led developing countries to unde-rrate
their own art. Given that most of the
population StiU Uve in rural communities, it
has no contact with art created in the cities.
Only a very reduced group of the African
élite ís devoted to coUectionism. Fot most
Africaas, art is still sometbing apparentiy
futile, since it has lost its ancient magic
powers. For this reasotí, art is reserved to
foreigaeis, without any regrets or jealousies".
"The Oldenbiug Kuastverein dares to exhibit
Seaegalese art."
Similar statements about an art diéntele
could already be read in Marshall Ward
Mount's book: African art, the years since
1920, published by Indiana University Press,
in Bloomington and London, in 1973.
This batrage of quotes comes from the dif-ferent
authois of the catalogue Añica Today,
organized in Paiis with the works of the Con-temporary
African Art CoUection and in
coUaboration with the Centro Atlántico de
Arte Moderno, with the itinerary, Las Pal­mas,
México and God knows where else.
Though its selective principie may appear
arbitrary with respect to the altruism of the
organizers, it only wants to project a prodi-gious
event that breaks the castrating silence
of the taboos imposed on African artistic
creation and also plays down the rídicule of
the artists that particípate in this kind of exhi-bition.
These opinions can be read in French,
Spanish, English and in almost all European
languages and generally the world over since
some time ago, with the solé purpose of
favouring the annulment and exploitation of
the Otber. Is the silence on behajf of African
authoríties a sign of tolerance, indiíference or
lack of Information on the subject? I would
like to ask why in the catalogues of exhibi-tions
organized by the state, wc find the
ñames and the unbelievable opinions of those
who in other contexts denígrate it. Even
worse, in shameful cases, these attitudes and
denigrating arguments are adopted by local
offícials who shake off allegiances and score
own-goals. This corrodes the sporting spirit
that Art requires. Günter Peus said in con-nection
with the 1977 FESTAC:
"In tbe context of tbis pan-afrícan exbibi-tiott,
wbere tbe artists were abosen by tbe
official representatives of fuadamentally dic­tatorial
govemments, an art exclusively des-tined
to tbe ^ory of tbe povferñú bas prevai-led,
creating a martial kitscb."
Can we generalize so easily? We realize
that the disinformation accumiüated on anth-ropological
discoveries, ethnohistory and
archaeology in Senegal, leads many misinfor-med
writers to afílrm imprudently that the
fine arts don't have any real tradition in the
country. We quote, precisely in order to
reflect justly on the problem, the excellent
article by Ibrahim Baba Kaké: African cul­ture,
cultura] identity, development and dia­logue
betweea cultures, that appeared in the
magazine Etbiopiques. The historian reminds
US that:
"...The rural paintings of Tassili in the
Sahara, and those of the Kalaharí desert pro-vide
a testimony of a pictorial art sepárate
from architecture where painting can be con-sidered
an art per se. The arts of communi-cation
have enjoyed a similar status in Afíican
societies. Furthennore, many ritual ceremonies
and many popular gatherings include a thea-trícal
and communicative element where dan­ces
and music frequently are integrated in
ritual procesions and poetic recitáis, making
up a dynamic whole that derives its meaning
from the ritual character of the event. If we
examine the religious dimensión we can only
confírm that África is the paradise of ani-mism."
With the foUowing reference the historian
concludes his analysis of the predominant
situation in presentday African Arts:
"...Black African culture is not the appa-rent
synchretism conceived and supported by
the mass-media of western countries or of
new african states."
Starting from a critical and objective visión
of current african reality, he adds later:
"It is worthwhile defíning the contemporary
social structure of África and fínding out if it
contains elements of valid reform..."
Having proved in a rigorous analysis the
persistence of a notably infiltrated colonial
mentality, bent on perverting the develop­ment
of the arts with the aid of certain offí­cials
who have replaced the ttaditional chiefs,
he States:
"...The African believes that political and
economic domination don't necessarily imply
the destruction of the other's cultural valúes.
The West, with its universalist conquest,
doesn't sepárate territorial conquest from cul­tural
invasión."
Since the Uth century weVe inherited this
same memory that many africans beheve
genetic while it is solely historical. This rela-tive
ignorance, compared to the avidity of
the International Empire of profit and its
lucrative operations, and especially with real
cooperation, proves that the inadequacy of
the methods applied to cultural investment,
the inadaptation of museographic institutions,
together with the notorious rift between cul­ture
and education, hinder the just reception
due to African art at home and in other
parts. To the contrary, the growing void crea-ted
by the lack of decolonization of the ima-gination
brings the bombardment of new ste-reotypes,
new temptations that overeóme us
helplessly.
In his article, Black Aáican creation under
superior tutorsbip, Mamadou Traoré Diop,
críes out in favour of establishing replies sui-table
to the demands of cultural creativity,
for "...a new model of more limiting rela-tions
tends to be dramatically imposed, in
terms of a deviation from creation and
artists, pursuing only the interests of a hege-monic
policy of presence and influence..."
International exhibitions, better curated by
some, are increasingly prcferred by govem­ments
than national ones. Within a frame-work
of cooperation, they are more efficient
for the development of cultural exchanges.
But, let US be sure for once, that only
through knowledge of our own valúes shall
we be known by others and this awareness
gives US a better knowledge of the other.
Our artists, ignored by criticism in the
most part, yet recorded by geopolitics that
pretends to establish a self-proclaimed cultu­ral
standardization, are tracked down and
damaged in their development by wily mer-chants
who would like to reduce them to
those formulas that have guarantueed their
success and the hegemonic aspirations already
mentioned. The pitiful conditions that mar-ginalize
these artists to the bohemian and the
exotic, simultaneously leads to the extrover-sion
of their cultural valúes.
Depríved of status and means, their aban-don
and their dubious integration propitiates
alienation of their sensibility, and opens the
way to the criticisms of the mentioned cata­logues.
Harrassed by the huge barrage of pre-fabricated
illusions, of stereotypes alien to
our reality, exported or imported as models,
they favour, beyond the mere aesthetic appre-ciation,
an assimilation of implied figurative
ideologies: Superman, Batman, Badpainting,
and also violence and power.
These iconographic doctrines ensure our
interior decorating.
In our homes, the works which stem from
our imagination and enhance the habitat are
substituted by chromolitographic reproduc-tions,
posters, nudes, plástic ware, foreign
cinema, pop and sport stars; calendars and
hyperkitsch associations. For an altemative
history of art, the North American Susan
Vogel comments:
"A far more useful bistory of art could be
structured round two great ideologies we
bave just discussed (Autbenticity and Black-ness).
Tbe íirst defends tbe rigbt of tbe Afri­cans
to créate wbatever art tbey want, inclu-ding
works ressembling European art, and
the idea tbat tbeir art sbould be accepted as
"african". Tbe second, well-deíined by Seng-bor
as négritude, tnaintains tbat tbe artists
sbould reject tbe inñuences and tbe materials
from abroad and ddve into tbeir own añican-
After indicating that it is difiScult for us to
find materials and space appropiate for crea­tivity
in África, and noting with surprise that
a poU reveáis Üiat no african artist subscribes
to Art Forum, we have, according to her,
the reasons that explain why the bcst Inter­national
artists prefer to Uve abroad, espe­cially
in the First World, because it is the
best and perhaps the only road to salvation
recommendable for their careers. What's
more, the Afro-American Ima Ebong, Susan
Vogcl's aide-de-camp, whom I saw in Dakar,
in June 1990 assures us:
"Négritude became a national discourse
tbat decided wbicb groups and wbicb indivi­duáis
in tbe world of tbe arts were incorpo-rated
into tbe principal trend and wbicb were
marginaliged."
Further on, after mentioning the deplora­ble
desertions of artists from the Village des
Artistes, the ruining of the Musée Dynami-que,
condemning the fact its archives have
A ' i A ^ i i í A
^
become repositories distant from the city, she
compares the École de Dakar and the
AGIT-ART lab with the alledged manipula-tions
of cultural politics after independence.
Senghor is seen as the idealist, but after his
loss, the artists are badly treated by Abdou
Dioufs pragmatism. I would rather read
what she says to avoid confusions:
"Nevertheless, négrítude was ¡imited in
many cases as an aesthetic, not only due to
its consideration of ancestral afrícan art
forrns but to the abstract characterization of
the valúes it reckoned to be intrinsically afrí­can,
like intuition, emotivity, rhythm and
vital forcé. These valúes followed an order
established by a specifíc and foimalist agenda
conceived for contemplating the metaphysical
dimensión attríbuted to them. Négrítude also
seemed to act as a litmus test, valuing the
capacity of any artistic manifestation to
satisfy the requisites of Senghor for a natio-nal
culture. That's how Senghor in efíect ¡imi­ted
the aesthetic options of the École de
Dakar to a formal and strictly ideológica!
alloted área."
She elaborates further: !
"The departure of Senghor as president in
1980 revealed that the favourable position he
had given artists was really fragile. The ima­ges
and identities the artists had created to
support national cultural politics were not
interpreted as superíluous symbols that could
no longer fínd support in the new spirit of
economic and political pragmatism, and were
ideologically at odds with the reality of Ufe
after Senghor. In fact, it seems that towards
the 80's, the historical importance of the
École de Dakar's work was exhausted."
k> VsJ
According to her, neither of our presidents
has managed to solve the crisis of the artists,
AGIT-ART does it better. Between Flag and
Mask, a work by Issa Samb, is the evidence.
The iconographic interpretation that this indi­vidual
construes of the flag and the mask
hanging from a tree and swaying in the wind
reveal that:
"...In a certain way these objects are a
group of ideas that act as reference to con-temporary
art in Senegal... This grouping is
a paradigm that suits Senegal's case admi-rably."
Faced with such rigidity of spirit, I think
that the least effort undertaken by these au-thors
causes grave damage to África and to
the whole world. Similar facts forcé us to
recommend to the authorities that cooperate
with institutions, patience and prudence. It's
best to do things well than to do them wi-thout
thinking of their possible effects, impli-cations
and repercussions. The quoted refe-rences
are the product of a superficial men-tality
that delights more in quantity than in
quality. For it, the number of exhibitions
and their publicity are superior curricular
valúes than investment in the formation of
staff for the conservation and the continuity
of african artistic and cultural heritage.
Though there is a certain margin of disagree-
^P
>^W 9
A
ment bctween both Americans, we can per-ceive
the sarcasm and the absurdity of these
debates that tour the world as if they were
our tnie history in the absence of something
better. Isn't it time we read the history of
contemporary senegalese art from the pen of
a compatriot? Can the lack of material
means eventually blind our spiñt? All the spe-culation
and senseless experimentation that
come from misinformation or from bad inten-tion
can be denied by our wül, in my opi­nión,
to combat ignorance and overeóme this
aggressive passion that forecasts destruction.
All together we can replace it with creati-vity.
These catalogues are aimed at creating the
idea that Africans tread on their own mine
field. Like televisión, a model media that day
by day replaces the traditional teller, these
trap-exhibitions, disguised under the mask of
impartiality, with an aura of idolatry, philan-trophy
and patemalism, are very good at
taking in the less wary. There's no person
alive who's written with so much originality
and precisión about african art as Léopold
Sedar Senghor. This, has always been admit-ted
by Issa Samba. His prose, and above all
his poetry, his visión and sensibility have
emancipated, the one inextricable from the
other, forms and colours in preeminent cla-rity,
a transparent opaqueness that only fool-hardy
antagonism ignores. As a political
man, history sets him among those who
defend and reinforce our culture with intui-tion
and intelligence; with a lucidity inherent
to the well-being of our mental and spiritual
faculties. I think that these authors and their
informers haven't read Senghor due to an
intellectual blindness that confuses them.
The publicity of their marketing is nuanced
in the words of Jean Pigozzi, coUector and
promotor, as he points out, of artists with
foreign ñames and ignorant of the West's
valúes, ñnancer of the safari África Today,
he says:
"/ hope África Today will briag you as
mucb pleasure and deligbt as it has to me.
Watcb out! CoUectiag contemporary african
art can tum into a passion and requires
much time, but it's mucü cbeaper tban coUec-ting
Van Gogb and Cy Twombly! (Let's not
forget tbe ead). P.D. We siacerely bope that
André Magnin isn't devoured by a lion. Tbat
would seriously set back tbe development of
tbis passioaate coUection!..."
As you may see, this strategy doesn't differ
very much from Marketing, animal skins,
ebony or ivory smuggjing, or from brain was-hing.
These agents of a new fashion that
make eclecticism the exotic menú of the mar-ket,
think they are Christopher Columbus.
AfiUcted by mental amnesia, the worshippers
of "savage thou^t", provoking amóng tiiem-selves
and others \Aask hoks in memory Uan-keted
by a strange innocence, believe obses-sively
that seeing is living the illusion. It is
difficult for them to distinguish between what
is África, and what is the extra dimensión of
their voracity. This observation is valid for
the whole world.
Their market has created and produced,
starting with the art coUection of the past,
profítable curiosities to please the demands of
eccentricity. This same situation threatens the
art of the present. Artists and artisans every-whcre
have been the willing or the unwitting
victiihs of the trap set by industrial or media-nized
production. Their art means far less a
group of ordered aesthetic valúes than ideo-logical
or monetary profitability. The stated
example of Van Gogh is the example that
reveáis the power of the market over reason
and art.
The combination of the commercial and
the creative demands caution and modera-tion,
but, especially, thought on the lamen­table
consequences of projects like the craft
village for tourists and on the genuine coope-ration
that we all desire. This means achie-ving
unity in our efforts within a harmony
that is liberating and generates human
energy.
At the present moment, in ñame of a
corrupted and deviated concept we can
observe the proliferation of a range of pro­jects
of cultural standardizatíon that is
everywhere presented as globalism, post-modemism,
internationalism. The sub-products
of this standardized culture, whose
true ñame is alienation, are foisted on the
group of dependent countries. Although
effort is made to vary the menú in order to
increase profít and control, we must remem-ber
that the scars left by totalitarianism and
the confusions that shake capitalist societies,
question and contest the actual situation.
This impasse, whose exit is the secret of an
awareness-process, remains blocked (in the
sense of effective correlation between a pro-blem
and its most eficient and operative solu-tion
in terms of real experience), by the lack
of liberating solutions on behalf of the domi-nant
ideologies, because, ideology, in short,
can't be the origin of art. To the contrary,
blessed are those that avoid its triviality, the
demagogy and the arbitrariness that tend to
giorify provocation as a banner, paralysing
any attempt at originality.
However, including all obstacles and para-doxes,
that are interferences to be overeóme,
nobody can deny the efforts made by the
State. Thanks to its insistence in resolving
these problems, it guarantees, in relation to
its means, education. This biennial, this de­bate,
are exemplary occasions that we would
all like to see with greater frequency. The
rest, pertains to us, it is our responsability to
look after it and to contribute, because we
have to realize that the state has limitations
and limits that a community's will and initia-tive
can develop with interest in mutual coUa-boration,
and sublimate them for the benefit
of society. The artists are voluntaríes of this
community that offer the participation and
the reception of their art's communion. Pri-vate
enterprise has here an example to
support and to defíne in all faimess.
What this contríbution pretends is an invi-tation
to revise thoughtfuUy the subject of
the reception and distribution of african art,
far from setting out to be a conclusión or a
deterministic defínition, precisely this: the
reactivation of research and the conservation
of our cultures, of our history and of our art
in a moment of change and world restructu-ring,
which is for us more than an instru-ment
of knowledge. A symbol of our iden-tity,
it is a source of wisdom and of faith in
our own complexity, in our cultural wealth,
that is, among other central priorities, a
hard, but dynamic succession of crossfertili-zation,
coUisions and integration; but above
all a succession of acts of faith.
It is also interesting to note that despite
the lack of direct contact and frequent con­tad
that we would wish with the work of
artists that have preceded us and access to
theoretical formulations of aesthetics, Afríca's
contemporary art, within its diversity and its
unity reveáis certain peculiar characterístics
that mark its aesthetic and its spontaneity.
Our traditions, actions and reactions íncor-porated
into the accumulated wisdom of man-kind,
are the fírst factors of this result. Wit-hout
artistic sensibility, the intuition and emo-tive
power required by these object-subjects
that continué to represent their creators and
perpetúate their presence among the living,
wouldn't exist. Our tribute will be constant
to the wise creators of this herítage that is
gaining defmition.
How we would like to have the opinión of
those artists who have had considerable prac-tice
and experience when transmitting our
aesthetic valúes! To be able to find it illus-trated
in books, newspapers, magazines,
audiovisual media, naturally accessible to all
homes. And what about the opinión of those
other intellectuals, the whole of society?
We can be sure that our music, our dan­ces,
our literature and also our story-telling
have a vigour that maintains the power of
language, and its correspondent diffusion
through the media in the senegalese home.
Why do the fíne arts lack this privileged
publicity space? Can we disregard the mani-festation
of our present valúes?
André Magnin, collaborator of the Geor-ges
Pompidou Centre, says about his selec-tion:
"There are hundresds of creators living
and working throughout África; it would be
rídiculous, with fifteen artists, to give an idea
of a whole continent's art, with such a com-plex
history, a defínitive or exhaustive idea.
I don't know if they are the best artists. I
don't know what the word best means when
we apply it to an artist. This selection is the
result of compromise and afiinity; I have cer-tainly
trusted my Western memory, but I've
tried to forget its mirror-image in a Europe
far too blinded by sacred hallucination, that
simultaneously dominates its narcissistically
enclosed art."
Let him discem the dissonance between
the works and the functions he attríbutes to
them to avoid the utopia of forgetting his
mirror. To forget means repression, and
remembering too, and this should be noted
by the new Africanists searching new Social
Sciences. Let them consider what Paul
Eluard tells us: "...artists give us new eyes,
art critics new glasses."
África is more than a visión, its reality
goes beyond the promised good visión of the
binoculars that believes it is mirrored as a
mirage, as an object or as another merchan-dise.
Let's medítate this, without the onus of
Cartesian objectivity or the Hegelian scheme
where África didn't fit in. I believe, that for
everybody's just benefit, a better reception at
home and a better national distribution will
make African art the symbol of recognized
progress forged by all of society. It is this
that would enable a better cooperation bet-ween
artists and the world as the hindú sage
Rabindranath Tagore wished:
"...towards a future so difíerent from the
past as is the tree from its seed."
As a Mandinga that has travelled through
the verdant Casamance, I can assure you
that the succulence of ripe fruit comes from
the fact that the tree has been planted in the
most fertile soil and has received the best
attention. Art, as the most fertile land of
África, can't conceive artistic creation as sub-developed
or peripheral. This truth, that
thank God is firm, we must turn into our
presence:
"..To admire black art badly, is to run the
risk of gathering no fruit."
To stop at the superficial appearances of
art suppresses the quality of the sincere dia­logue
we can build with its richness. Let's lis­ten
to Léopold Sedar Senghor's advice in his
article, Black African Aesthetics. Its genero-sity,
like new sap, surges again, isolating and
displacing the parasites that invade the tree.
Our art is only the expression of an intrin-sically
african spirituality. Imbued with its
past, that the work appropiates, an emanci-patory
longing reactualizes it and purifies it
anew, transforms it and tums it into an infi­nite
reply similar to the one Amadou Ham-paté
Ba defended:
"...To take África to its máximum expan­sión,
by the path of genteleness, good beha-viour,
respect for our neighbour's ideas, none
of which exeludes firmness, constancy, perse-verance
in our own ideas and the unrelenting
pursuit of their realization. Such is the voca-tion
of twentieth century Africans."
We can't turn this ancestral wealth and its
mystery, into a passtime for the amateurs of
exoticism. Its magic isn't importable. We
want our heritage to be rid of formulas and
clichés that make it mediocre, lead it to con-venience
and banality; to repetition and to ter­minal
folklorism. How can a curator affirm
that art in África has nothing to do with a
progressive history, made up of the succes-sion
of real problems that are solved, accor-ding
to him, when one talks about western
art because artists have believed in the dimen-
Kairouan flat-woveii textile motif: Banaers.
sion opened up by Picasso and Duchamp?
Our art dates from before prehistory and
duiing its life it has never stumbled over
false problems; it merely resumes that which
fulfills US and gives us faith in life.
Our works have denied the impossible and
given it form. Francine N'diaye has underU-ned
it: "...tbe Afrícan patiimooy is recupera-ted
by a universal pictorial language tbat
geaerates a powerfuUy personal expression".
Also, Iba N'diaye states: "...tbe artists of
New África mil belp tbeir fellows to get out
of tbe cultural ghetto wbere certain people
would like to see tbem coníüied more or less
consciousfy". The poet Joe Bousquet defends
the same attitude:
"...tbe soul shines naturally with the geneo-rity
that it has been able to fínd. I'tn impo-tent;
Man is grotesque when he fears man."
For us, man is the principie of remedy.
Art takes us nearer to him without creating
distance simultaneously. It is thanks to vir-tualities
that have survived that our feelings
have found in artistic creation a natural
model of expression. Far from setting out to
explain, these works only communicate and
present their own essence, the interpretation
of destiny. At least, our's is never absent.
Youssou N'dour sang this in the melodies
of "Set" and "Yaru", clear visión, limpidity,
propriety, respect, courtesy and humility,
essential valúes for any recuperation and any
intelligent revisión. Source and recapitulation
of the true and the real, the works corres-pond
to our need of expressing sensibility
and our knowledge of foreign and national
traditions. Therein lies the significance of our
art. True to itself despite the smallest change
and celebration. Perpetual abstraction, bridge
or road between the absolute and the tran-sient;
about its rythm, the Senegalese poet
says:
"...The architecture of beíng, the inner
dynamics that gives it shape, the pattem of
waves it emitts for the attention of others, the
puré expression of strength, the vibrant colu­sión,
that through our senses, touches the
very fibre of being."
This constellation, a prism through which
the spirit takes shape, is a path along which
the etemal enters human reality in order to
have effect, transformed in new appearances.
Incamate spirituality, artistic african creation
also makes man:
"...the crossroads of symbolic corraponden-ces,
that go from the world to man, and vice
versa."
In sympathy with the Senegalese philoso-pher
Alassane N'Dew, the poet from Marti-nique,
Aimé Cesaire sings, calming us:
Eia for the royal Kailcedrat
Eia for tbose who've never invented any-tbing
For tbose wbo bayen't explored
For tbose wbo haven't conquered
But abandon themselves, inspired, to tbe
essence of all tbings
Caieless of domination, tbougb tbey follow
tbe rules of tbe world.
Truly, older sons of tbe world
Sensitive to all tbe world's stirring
Fraternal wind of all tbe world's stirring
Puré bed of all tbe world's waters
Spark of tbe world's sacred fíre
Flesb of tbe ílesb of tbe world pulsating
witb it.
Amadou Hampaté Ba similarty takes pan in
the celebration of island and continent:
"...Synthesis of the universe and crossroads
of vital energies, man is therefore called upon
to be a point of balance, where, through him,
all of the diffeient dimensions he represents
may flow. Then he will deserve the ñame of
Mea-Kumanyon, the interiocutor of Maa-Ngala
(the supieme bdng), and defender of creation's
harmony."
To quench one's thirst in this wisdom that
identifíes the source of its existence in the
roots of being and that, also, has known to
exalt in its art and thou^t, the imagination
becomes the secret law of the real, which is
to incorpórate it more intimately and actively
into our creativity. It is to valué the underl-ying
unity and Üie superior coherence that
articulates it. The clear sighted will and the
enthusiasm to explore these terrítories, some-times
mysteriousty mutilated by Histoty, requi-res
from us, preparation, purifícation and uni-fication
without confusi^ the passage bet­ween
levéis of this vast symbolic network.
Only the wise recovery of our languages that
pits known sensations against leamed formu­las
can open the way to a reality that we can
experience and express forcefuUy, with love
and respect when explored.
It is clear for us that the artist instructs us
how to look not only through his works, but
through the best part of his personality, with
the honesty and generosity that all truth con-tains,
and with love; at least, that of the
artist. His work ptuifies of all influence what
is intrinsically his. He therefore expresses in
the most original way which is most singular
and universal. Longing to surpass himself
continually to satisfy this essential need, to
créate sincerely, excuses him from accumula-ting
useless knowledge through work and
purifícation. He develops transgressing the
application of assimilated techniques, purging
them of artifíciality, of arbitrariness and of
the parasites that disturb the legitímate cla-rities
of the spirit. It is there, better than in
any other part, that conscience, that organi-zing
will, when it illumines passions reveáis
unity within multiplicity, the simple within
the complex, order in disorder, in one word,
animates "the intelligibility of the living".
Our much missed Gera NTbengue, virtuoso
of the suweer, said:
"I like, especially, talking with draughts-men,
with those who love drawing. I can't
explain it to anybody who doesn't feel love.
A draughtsman is always a student, he sear-ches,
and he is also a man of good heart.
The pen must be left on its own, shapes will
come, and that is all."
This advice, immediately takes us to the
boundary where the realm of valúes, where
beauty and generosity of the work meet, for
those that can master the rebellion of sight,
like the Dogon lock that scares indiscreet
onlookers away. He who is able to unite the
soul with the heart of matter, as Gastón
Bachelard says, defending, "a really alive
material imagination", cióse to the one de-void
of sophistication and complex that Mi-chel
Leiris suggested in relation with black
afrícan art and artists, an imagination that is
able to possess the irmer essence of universal
matter, the great natural substances of Na-ture:
water, night, sun light, substances that
presuppose a "refined taste", and require no
additives.
This locus that we explore has the same
generosity that it proposes as an answer to
our wish for adoming it emotionally. That is
how the controUing and moderating task of
museography is defined, that tríes to show us
an exhibition in a more intelligent way.
However, as you well know, the materialism
of this society, though it reyolutionizes our
knowledge beyond any doubt, fails in the
territory of art. It will be futile to travel
through the world seeking art, for he who
doesn't carry beauty within will never find it.
For this reason, art has always been a mark
of beauty and goodness. Here Teranga is
manifested. I can't help quoting Baudelaire,
who wrote in August 1851, in Au fur et á
mesure que l'homme avance dans la vie:
"...Beauty shall only be the promise of hap-piness
(Stendhal, I believe, said this). Beauty
will be the form that guarantuees máximum
goodness, faith fidelity to oath, loyalty in the
execution of a contract, ñnesse in the intelli-gence
of relationships. Ugliness will be
cruelty, avance, stupidity and dishonesty.
Most young people ignore these things and
assume them as their own risk. Among us,
some have already leamed it, but it is somet-hing
we_ leam only by ourselves. What effi-cient
means could I use to persuade a young
rake that the irresistible aÁection I feel for
oíd ladies, these people who have suffered for
their lovers, their husbands, their childien and
also for their own errors, carnes no sexual
desire? If the idea of universal love and virtue
accompany us during all our pleasures, these
would become torment and remorse."
Here is something that would do good to
Jacques Soulillou and Stisan Vogel that daré
to wish that Afrícan artists coimect with the
main stream and the perenially open horizon
that defínes Western actuality, tendentiously
exemplifíed, where the new world order of
the North Amerícans won't survive unless
multiculturalism rectifies their visión. They
daré to cast judgement, forgetting the icono-clast
and the barbaríty, the despotism and
tyranny perpetrated in all of the conquered
terrítoríes. Jacques Soulillou comes out with
the foUowing:
"...Wanting to prove at any price that crea­tivity
is in good health, many exhibitions of
so-called african an err on account of their
quantative optimism and lack disoeming capa-city.
Furthermore, this can be explained due
AHA^^'-^ A
to the absence of a market, of exhibition
structures, in short, to everything that acts as
a stimulant and catalyst for talents."
This is the bait tendered to the Ul-informed,
be they artists or authorities with positive or
negative inclinations. To enjoy African art,
we have to be acquainted with the widest
impUcation of the term, as is indicated by
our relationship with ancestors. Commercial
greed and historicism aren't enough to love
and communicate its artistic merits. Quite the
oposite, this is only good for the missionaries
of art, reward seekers, safan hunters and the
clientéle who are the object of this pemicious
promotion of the image that the merchants
deem profitable for their country's or their
global planet's hungry pockets. Let them not
forget what Jean-Paul Sartre said in Orphée
Noir: "...Seen from Senegal, globalism
appears príncipally a beautiful dream."
The vanity of the superior pretensions
always subjacent in the monologues which
certain western galleries and their associates
have with artists from other cultures finds its
máximum expression in the neutralization or
the reduction of the other, while keeping the
appropiate distances. In the preface to the
exhibition Magiciens de la Teñe, inaugurated
in the celebrations of the Bicentenary of the
French Revolution, the head curator, Jean
Hubert Martin, argües in order to prove that
we are dealing with power relations and not
with natural powers in this encounter fabri-cated
round the word magic, that:
"...We must distrust our schematic labels
that carry the risk of concealing the comple-xity
of certain local situations. The criteria
used to select the artists are akin to those
that would determine a Western selection,
applied, however, with a considerable number
of variations."
^
You can imagine the charlatan's market;
there you can buy liberty, fraternity and
equality. What perturbs us about these real
facts, is the growing number of people who
having seen this kind of exhibition, come to
check the veracity of the Information recei-ved.
What is disconcerting and ambiguous, is
that in all the catalogues I have mentioned,
insults and acknowledgements are found pell-mell,
addressed to our artists and authorities,
thanking them for their kind participation
"in the success" of the event. To rub salt
into the wounds, the authors of these irreve-rent
remarks appear in catalogues of modem
Senegalese art where the quality of edition
and printing are clearly deficient. Spellings
aren't checked, neither factual errors. These
documents reflect the consideration we give
to our aesthetics and to its contents, to our
foremost banner in matters of cultural coope-ration.
Meanwhile, in other parts, televisión
programmes and articles on the subject con­tinué.
Though in the world we find sensitive
people who can observe art, without having
to read the accompanying text, it isn't the
majority. To the contrary, the most part
refer to the media and to guides for blinke-red
tourists foUowing sensationalism. Is the
responsability for this situation due to an
incompetent system?
Ibrahima Baba Kaké expressed it well:
"...A country without a leader, unprotected,
can only conserve fragments of a culture that
has become inorganic and is given over to
the formality of these officials, who have subs-tituted
the traditional chiefs chosen in the
past for their beliefs and their devotion to the
protection of a community of interests inhe-rent
to social "well-being", whether western
or "advanced locáis", produces the same
results: the denial of a traditional culture that
is despised."
As an example, we have the reply of Frans
Haks, director of the Groninguen Museum
to Giaconto di Pietrantonio, coUaborator of
Flash Art:
"G.D.P.: Referring to what we were saying
about the colonizing absorbent West, that
feels the need to appropiate the East or
África in order to recharge its energies, do
you think this crisis could be solved through
loans or by ravaging other countries?
F.H.: Yes. For instance, when the Japanese
exhibition took place, we had another exhibi­tion
of contemporary Russian art at the same
time, which seems a great shame to me. I
think we must be patient until results come
up. I mean, that it took África twenty years
of democracy and postcolonialism before we
had any results."
Presentday cosmopolitism denles the ega-litarian
right of difference, and internationa-lism
only exists to the extent that each cul­ture
conserves its possibilities, its vitality and
energy. The economic and cultural globaliza-tion
demands from the Senegalese the redou-bled
responsability of not letting their coun­try
become the object of powers alien to
their interests. Which model of modemization
are we heading for? It is vital to think about
this, for given the loss of the native valúes of
sensibility, the mimesis of the foreign beco-mes
a generalized practise in all teaching ins-titutions.
Thus, loss of identity and the chan-nels
of expression can't be modernity, or
modemization; quite the opposite, it's a
regression that pivots on itself.
Western utopias sink, yet the damned of
the earth remain everywhere, become poten-tial
refuse consummers, of the most toxic
kind, victims of xenophobia and inequahty
before the law and difference. The violation
of the cultural integrity of the others conti­nué,
transforms their patrimony into monu-ments
of signs, strong currencies, profane
objects by virtue of the miracle of the new
decodification laid down by the expert and
readjusting eye of certain foreign merchants
and some Africans oriented in business.
Barbara Prezeau (Haití).
Le polyptique dubon saurage. 1992.
Their perfect projects decontextualize,
through salón painting, the sacred atmosp-here
of museums to idolatrize and descérate
the visions and ideas contained there. Yet
they can't help us noticing that the sermons
and well designed cults conceived as mecha-nical
practices of conversión cold-bloodedly
imposed on us as symbols of cultural coope-ration,
are projections of the unconscious
that turn the Other into a big alibi. In the
catalogue of Magiciens de la Terre, Fierre
Gaudibert tells us, with great diñiculty, I ima­gine:
"...The symbolic violence of the West's
artistic power of legalization, with a naturally
universal pretensión, is applied with terror to
all artists of these "other" countries. They
are judged immediately and almost automa-tically
as followers and exponents, as poor
imitators of Western artists, known and con-sidered
as desirable visual objects apt for
domestic collection but unworthy of being in
real or imaginary museums. A dilemma that
traps them diabolically, beyond real action
and proposition, with the exception of very
rare examples of brilliant synthesis or extre­me
individual singularities. What's more, it's
true that to fínd the balanced attitude bet-ween
consideration and contempt when ju-dging
artists of cultures so different to ours
is diffícult. The idea of decentralization is
necessary without giving up any criteria of
Creative quality. A cióse watch benevolently
practised seems preferable, inspite of its sub-jectivity
and arbitrariness, to the ofíicial selec-tions
that we have been able to appreciate in
certain biennials."
Universality isn't the exclusive property of
any civilization since we can only it identify
it in the relationship between all civilizations.
True dialogue presupposes the recognition of
the Other, both in terms of identity and au-the
Other, both in terms of identity and au-thority,
and without this, any attempt at uni-versalizing
reconciliation is futile. Such con-cepts
appear in La Pensée Africaine by Alas-sane
N'daw. r d like to remind these critics
that they take a look at their own history
before opening their mouths. Let them reread
the history of the Impressionists, and see
how the press kept on treating them as men-tally
insane, affected by optical disfunctions
that would be a challenge for specialized
ophthalmologists: Joseph Emile Müller gives
many examples of the persecution of these
artists by the press that today are so magni-ficently
priced:
"In 1877 Albert Wolff, the Fígaro colum-nist,
wrote: «...it's a case of madness», and
another newspaper, on the same theme, «it's
a compromise with the contemptible and the
disgusting»..."
Why did the Salón des Indépendents open?
What was the principie of selection of the
official Salón that forced the rebels to defend
their freedom in heterodoxy? Today those
that exhibited regularly in the official Salón
aren't even spoken about. Let them reread
the "damned poets", especially Baudelaire, in
his critique of the salons, his posthumous
work, L'Art Romantique, criticising the reti-cence
of the French to Wagner's music and
American society's to Edgar Alian Poe. Let
them reread Daniel Henry Kahnweiler's Aest-hetic
Curiosities and his Aesthetic Confes-sions.
Or listen to Picasso telling Hélene Par-melin
that when he painted he was surroun-ded
by a brotherhood of artists like Paul
Eluard's Fréres Voyants, and that they were
aware of having spoiled the contemporaneity
inaugurated by Picasso and Duchamp. Let
them reflect on the rebellions of Miró, Mas-son,
Max Emst, Victor Brauner and so many
others against the admirable poet André Bre­tón.
It's obvious they've leamt nothing from
Mahaux or Kandinsky, or from Barthes' Cri-ticism
of Truth. The phenomenom isn't new.
It's a question of comparing the points of
view adopted in the books by Elie Faure,
Kenneth Clark, Klaus Honnef and Edward
Lucie Smith; Gaudibert states:
"The nostalgia of the South, isn't only that
of the lost paradise, of nature refound and
recomposed unity, but a search for spirituality
and energies whose absence generales suffe-ring
for an increasing number of the North's
citizens. Furthermore, perhaps the journey
through the art of the Other could stimulate
the searchers. Or, if not, do western artists
only hope to rejuvenate, revitalize and refresh
themselves? To have a blood transfusión? To
effect a return to the origins, the beginnings,
the sources, to the Mother, to uterine life?,
Perhaps."
Do they really want to go on a regressive
trip, after all that was done to imítate the
cubist experience with oriental art? Let's not
be astonished, because in all attempts at
schism, what is contemptible, though univer­sal,
stands in the limelight alongside the mar-veis
of art and aesthetics. From Manzoni to
John Miller, including Arthur Graven, who in
1910, wrote, 'T'm going to eat my shit", to
Jeff Koons who exhibits photo-murals of his
sexual or pomographic activities with his wife,
fecal expression has become a commonplace
of contemporary Western art. The mosaic on
the front cover of FLASH ART (Internatio­nal
Ed), which no doubt you have seen, is
called Panoramic View. Bits of shit making
up a pattern reproduced in ceramic. The
work is fit to decórate a dinning room, a ga-
Uery, a museum or a palace. Can this be the
horizon Soulillou intends for us? The work
was shown in the selection by Jan Hoet,
director of the Ghent Museum and general
curator of the IX Dokumenta at Kassel.
Eventually Jan Hoet decided that Africans
could take part in Kassel. That's why we were
able to see the sculpture of the Nouba wrest-lers
by our compatriot Ousmane Sow. The con­clusión
of the article that considers this exhi-bition
and its curator, Dokumenta IX, more
is a mess, published in Art News states:
"...Considering what may result from Hoet's
ambitions concerning ecstasy, passion needs
order to be comprehensible and balanced.
Every art-loving person likes to think he is
touched by divine power. The pity is that
Hoet has been burnt out by it."
I prefer the audacity, the boldness and the
radicality of Picasso and Duchamp. This kind
of deconstruction that contradicts the history
of the European museum celebrates the
triumph of its victory over the rigidity of a
past that it rejected for its corruption. It's a
local and not a world scale phenomenom. We
recall, don't we, that the birth of the museum,
after the Muses, comes from the accumulated
loot of robbery sanctioned by the Church and
the Nobility as example of their civilizing task.
In the so-called third world, museums have
been adopted, and they must be adapted to
legitímate the rights of mdependence and cultu­ral
heritage.
México 1992.