Call me cynical (as many have), but I always found it a tad interesting that while European art was kept in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Sub-Saharan African, Asian, and Native American art was for the most part kept in the Museum of Natural History. You know, with the monkeys.
This sort of layout implied that European art is superior to the art of other cultures; I’ve even heard it said that African art “isn’t real art.” But no longer. A new exhibit is opening at the Met, showcasing African art and focusing on what it meant to be an African leader. The exhibit is called “Heroic Africans: Legendary Leaders, Iconic Sculptures,” and depicts the huge variety of African art style– from realism to abstract. It is a fascinating portrayal not only of African art, but of the historical politics of the continent’s various regions.
The exhibit looks like a fascinating combination of history, art, and politics, and explores the question of what it means to be a political leader.
A link to the article about this exhibit can be found here.
Be careful about your argument. If fact, the Met has a VERY extensive collection of African, South American (pre-Columbian), Oceana, and other non-Western art. It is a consequence of our own Western-European Centric culture that these collections developed later, but the attitude that you imply is not really present in this day and age. Furthermore, I don’t think there is much in the way of ART from these non-western cultures at the Museum of Natural History, since the focus there is not on art works, but on anthropological history. And… the show that just opened IS a very interesting and focused one. I saw it on Sunday, and then I went to the much bigger and much more expansive collections that are at the Met every day and was quite impressed that the regular collection (in my humble opinion) was actually far more comprehensive than the special collection. You should go and see both. It is quite an eye opener.