| African Faces, African Figures: The Arman Collection My dialogue with African art derives from the conviction that artistic creation arises from a common fund of humanity and that in the discovery of aesthetic solutions the making of masterpieces supersedes regions, cultures, and becomes part of the treasures from all places and all times of human creation. Armand Arman African Faces, African Figures: The Arman Collection is an extraordinary collection of more than 180 visually provocative objects from diverse regions of Africa. These objects were gathered over the past 40 years by world renowned French painter and sculptor Armand P. Arman, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s as part of the Paris-based Nouveau Realisme, or New Realism, movement and his American wife Corice Canton. Though previously shown only in parts at national and international locations, this exhibition gathers these rare and beautiful African objects together for the first time. While the Armans never attempted to create a comprehensive overview of sub-Saharan African art, they put together a collection of the highest quality African objects from diverse regions and cultures. Objects in the exhibition include Mende helmet masks (Sierra Leone and Liberia); Fang and Kota reliquary figures (Gabon); and Kongo power figures (People's Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Angola). African Faces, African Figures presents a variety of objects produced in Africa, along with descriptive text about the aesthetics and anthropology of each group by authors including Helene Joubert, Anne Marie Bouttiaux-Ndiave, Christopher Roy, Louis Perrois, Alain Nicolas, Gustaaf Verswijver, Luc de Heusch, Els DC Palmenaer, and Jacques Lombard. Organized by the Musee d'Arts Africains, ' Oceaniens, Amerindiens ol Marseille (France), African Faces, African Figures is accompanied by this full-color catalogue with articles by Alain Nicolas, the Director of the Musee d'Arts Africains, Oceaniens, Amerindiens; Jean-Hubert Martin; and Jacques Kerchachc, along with two extensive interviews with Arman conducted by Monique Barbier-Mueller and Alain Nicolas. The catalogue is richly illustrated and provides extensive descriptions of the objects and the peoples that produced them, including historical, religious, and geographic information. Photographs: Gerard Bonnet |
| The Kota and Mahongwe Collections |
| Additional information |
| According to oral tradition, an entire complex of related peoples—speaking Mbede or Mbete, and today occupying the region of the Sangha toward present-day Central African Republic and in the north of the Democratic Republic of Congo—began progressive migrations to the south beginning in the eighteenth century: Many such waves made their way to the valleys of a vast zone bordering Congo and Gabon, toward the upper Qgowe and the Zanaga region. These peoples, designated by the term Kota, from the name of one of the groups (the Kota-Kota or, from the area near the Ivindo), were the Obamba, Mindassa and Bawoumbou, on the one hand, and the Mahongwe, Shake, Shamaye, on the other, as well as some other small groups of lesser demographic importance. In times gone by, the Kota did not bury their dead, but "exposed" them in the distance of the forest. Only the chiefs of lineages were interred. Gradually, contact was entered into with other peoples (the Fang?) and the custom of burying important persons, then "treating" their remains, was begun. It is worth noting that, until relatively recently, persons dying in special circumstances—accident, suicide, execution for crimes or sorcery, etc.—would not have been allowed a normal burial. Kota rituals allied to ancestor cults aimed to honor illustrious deceased members of the lineage, but also would carefully keep them out of the reach of other villagers. E. Andersson has shown, in a very erudite analysis of Kota religious beliefs, that: 'for the Kota, the concept of 'good' has its basis in the fusion of two rather dissimilar notions of the divine." The belief in a celestial Nzambe and a terrestrial Nzambe, reflects the fusion of two religious universes and two cultures. The god of heaven being "the ancient god of a hunting people living under a patriarchal system and coming from the east, in all likelihood with a Hamitic component. " The god of earth would be "the god—or the goddess—fertility of an agrarian people; of matriarchal law, a people encountered by the ancestors during the course of their migrations. " It is true that today one again finds the two types of organization, patriarchal in the north, matriarchal in the south. |
| 113 Reliquary Figure Kota-Mindumu/Ondumbo Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 39.8 cm. 114 Reliquary Figure Kota-Mindumu/Ondumbo Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 33.7 cm. 115 Reliquary Figure Kota-Mindumu/Ondumu Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 42.6 cm. Sale at Sotheby's, New York, 15 April 1988, no. 115. 116 Reliquary Figure Kota-Mindumu/Ondumu Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood,copper H. 42 cm. Publications –F/ Chaffin. L’Art kota, p. 98, no. 21. 117 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 58.9 cm. 118 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 62 cm. 119 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 44.5 cm. 120 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 68.5 cm. 121 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 45.7 cm. 122 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 54 cm. 123 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 64.2 cm. Formerly in the R. Duperrier Collection. Publications: -L. Perrois, Arts du Gabon, Arts d'Afrique noire, Arnouville, 1979, no. 221 a and b, p. 216. -WM. Robbins & N.I. Nooter, AJhcan Art in American Collections, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, 1989, nos. 913-914. -F. Chaffin, I Art kota, p. 306, no. 189. 124 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Upper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 58 cm. 125 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 42.7 cm. Sale at Loudmer and Poulain (Druot), 8 June 1978, n 320, under the heading "Collection Pinto." Publications: -F. Chaffin, L'Artkota, p. 224, no. 12S. |
| 101 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon (Tipper Ogowe) Wood, copper; H. 49 cm. Sale of the H. Rubinstein Collection, 21-29 April 1966 at Park-Bernet Galleries, New York, catalogue n° 203. Publications: -F. Chaffin, L'Art kota, p. 140, no. 2. 102 Reliquary Janus Rgure Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 56.2 cm. Sale of the De Mire Collection, Dec. 1931, Paris. 103 Reliquary Janus Figure Southern Kota, Gabon/Congo Wood, copper; H. 61.8 cm. 104 Reliquary Figure Southern Kota, Gabon/Congo Wood, copper; H. 69.3 cm. Publications: -Werner Gillon, Collecting African Art, 1979. -F. Chaffin, L'art kota, p. 204, no. 104. 105 Reliquary Figure Southern Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 46.5 cm. 106 Reliquary Janus Figure Southern Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 58.5 cm.' Sale of the H. Rubinstein Collection, 21-29 April 1966 at Park-Bernet Galleries, New York, catalogue n° 200. 107 Reliquary Figure Southern Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 48 cm. 108 Reliquary Figure Southern Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 46.5 cm. 109 Reliquary Figure Southern Kota, Gabon/Congo Wood, copper; H. 46 cm. 110 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon/Congo Wood, copper; H. 37 cm. 111 Reliquary Figure Fragment Kota-Shamaye Gabon (north of Okoudja) Wood, copper; H. 24 cm. Formerly in the Jacques Kerchache Collection. 112 Reliquary Figure Kota, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 54 cm. Sale at Loudmer and Poulain, Paris, 14 June 1979, lot 166. Sale at Sotheby's, London, 3 July 1989. |
| The Mahongwe constitute the northern branch of the Kota peoples. Numbering between 3,000 and 5,000 individuals, distributed over several groups in two cantons near Mekambo and the region bordering Congo- Brazzaville up to Kelle, they have long remained apart owing to their obstinate resistance to the penetration of French administration. The Mahongwe practice an ancestor cult (bwete) that was at the center of a system of beliefs and rites. Fearful of the deceased, above all the phantoms that wander the forest (menkuku), but also the living- dead (elolongo)—beings who have been rejected by the world of the dead—the Mahongwe showed particular devotion to relics of important ancestors of the lineage, guarantors for the protection and survival of the group. These relics, augmented by some "charms" and other power substances, were kept in woven rattan baskets upon which were arranged reliquary figures in wood plated with thin brass strips, plates or wire. Copper originally came from the mines of Niari, and later from recycling. Even some old ancestor skulls were themselves covered with brass plates as well. The sub-style of the Mahongwe, formerly exhibited as Ossyeba, was not properly identified until 1966, after field research in east Gabon. The Libreville Museum conserves the first boho-na-bwete discovered in situ close to Mekambo: these are the reference examples which have allowed us to more accurately characterize Mahongwe art and, more particularly, to be able to discern two types of related objects, the large bwete (the founders of the lineage) and the small (their successors). These reliquary figures were exhibited during the course of public dances associated with the initiation ceremonies and rituals involving magical therapy. All such objects disappeared from the villages between 1940 and 1960. Confiscated by missionaries or destroyed by prophets of new syncretic religions (the "Mademoiselle" cult, for example), others were sometimes merely hidden in ancient cemeteries, deep in the forest, where, accidently, some are still been recovered. L.P. |
| 91 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 25 cm. Formerly in the Jacques Kerchache Collection. Dated: late 19th/early 20th century. Exhibition: Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, Jacques Kerchache 1967. Publications: - ]. Kerchache, J.L. Paudrat & L. Stephan, L' Art africain, Mazenod, Paris 1988, no. 591, p. 427. — C. Roy, J. Kerchache, Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, 1967 , p. 67, no. 22. - F. Chaffm, L'Art kota, p. 92, no. 15. — Arts d'Afrique noire, nos. 5 and 20. 92 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon (Mekambo region) Wood, copper; H. 45 cm. Formerly in the Jacques Kerchache Collection. Exhibition: Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, Jacques Kerchache 1967. Publications: - C. Roy, J. Kerchache, Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, 1967, p. 63. 93 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 36 cm. 94 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 28 cm. 95 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper, iron; H. IS cm. Formerly in the Jacques Kerchache Collection. Exhibition: Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, Jacques Kerchache 1967. Publications'. - C. Roy, J. Kerchache, Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, 1967, p. 36-37, specimen 8. - F. Chaffm, L'Art kota, p. 88, no. 12. 96 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 43.5 cm. 97 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. SO cm. Formerly in the Jacques Kerchache Collection. Sale at Sothebv's, London, 30 March 1987, Exhibition: Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, Jacques Kerchache 1967. Publications: — C. Roy, J. Kerchache, Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, 1967, p. 26, specimen 23. — F. Chaffin, L'Art kota, p. 87, no. 10. 98 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 37 cm. 99 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 33 cm. Exhibition; Le m 'boueti des Mahongoue, Jacques Kerchache 1967. Publications: — C. Roy, J. Kerchache, Le m'boueti des Mahongoue, 1961. 100 Reliquary Figure Mahongwe, Gabon Wood, copper; H. 41 cm. |
| Rand African Art home page Go to the Arman Collection of Mende masks Return to the Educational Resources page to see my Kota "You Be the Judge" page with 22 more figures. Go to see pictures of my Kota mbulu ngulu figure Go to see pictures of my Mahongwe bwete figure |
| Amateur, Accumulator,Collector, Connoisseur by Jacques Kerchache CLICK HERE to go to the brief article by Jacques Kerchache on his friendship and experiences with Arman. |
| Interview - Arman Armand New York, December 2nd, 1995 by Alain Nicolas From the book on Arman's collection: African Faces, African Figures |
| Arman, in 1985, before his "L'Heure de Tous" (Time for All) in front of the Saint-Lazare train station in Paris. |
| Arman, 76, Found-Object Sculptor, Dies By KEN JOHNSON Published: October 24, 2005 - NY Times Arman, the French sculptor known internationally for his surprising accumulations of trash and found objects, died Saturday at his home in New York. He was 76. The cause was cancer, said his wife, Corice Canton Arman. A founding member of the Nouveau Réalistes, a group that included Yves Klein, Daniel Spoerri and Jean Tinguely, Arman made his mark in the 1960's. For a famous exhibition in 1960 at the Iris Clert Gallery in Paris he responded to Klein's exhibition "La Vide" ("The Void"), which consisted of an entirely empty gallery, by filling the gallery floor to ceiling with rubbish and calling it "Le Plein" ("Full Up"). Arman went on to create accumulations of all kinds of objects, from partly squeezed-out paint tubes immersed in cast plastic to a 106-foot-high stack of military vehicles embedded in concrete, in Beirut; called "Hope for Peace," that 1995 work was commissioned by the government of Lebanon. He made sculptures out of everything from buttons to typewriters, musical instruments, car parts and bicycles, and he manipulated them in all sorts of ways - sometimes violently, as in works that involved dissection, burning and exploding, and sometimes by creating elegantly patterned arrangements. Like the found-object works of Marcel Duchamp, those of Arman challenge conventional notions about the nature of art. And like the serialized Pop Art works of Andy Warhol, they reflect anxieties about social issues like consumerism, waste and individuality in a society of mass production. Arman was also an avid collector of art and antiques, from knives to jukeboxes. His collections of Japanese arms and armor and of African art have been exhibited in museums around the world. Armand Pierre Fernandez was born on Nov. 17, 1928, in Nice in the south of France. (A printer's error prompted him to drop the d from his name in 1958.) His father, an antiques dealer, was an amateur painter and musician, and Arman began painting as a child. After earning a baccalaureate in philosophy and mathematics in 1946 he began to study painting at the École Nationale d'Art Décoratif in Nice, where he met Klein. Later he studied archaeology and Asian art at the École du Louvre. Arman made Surrealistic paintings in the 40's and moved on to abstraction in the 50's. An exhibition of works by Kurt Schwitters inspired his lifelong interest in assemblage, and he began to produce his accumulations of trash and found objects in the late 50's. In 1951 Arman became a teacher at the Bushido Kai Judo School in Madrid, and in the early 50's he served for two years as a medical orderly in the French army in Vietnam. Arman had his first solo exhibitions in London and Paris in 1956, and he was later included in many important international exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale and Documenta 4 in Kassel, Germany. He represented France in Expo '67, the world's fair in Montreal. He had his first solo show in New York at Cordier Ekstrom Gallery in 1961, and in 1964, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis organized his first American museum retrospective. In 2001, the Musée d'Art Moderne et d'Art Contemporain in Nice mounted a retrospective. Arman received United States citizenship in 1973, keeping his French citizenship. Since 1975 he had maintained homes and studios in New York and in Vence, France. His first marriage, to Eliane Radigue, ended in divorce. Arman is survived by his wife; his children from his first marriage, Francoise Moreau of Paris and Anne Lamb of Montpellier, France; his children from his second marriage, Yasmine Arman and Phillippe Arman, both of New York; five grandchildren; and five great-grandchildren. His son Yves died in 1989. |
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