abundant discussion of African art has dealt with where it fits into the bigger picture.

abundant discussion of African art has dealt with where it fits into the bigger picture. near of the earliest discussion, of course, simply asked to what extent it could get into the picture--any picture. The critical theorists pos more questions. in what manner should we frame the picture? in what manner should we look at it? by what means do we deconstruct it? Others asked, to what extent much does it cost? Where can I bribe it? How do we repatriate it? The questions continue, unless for the past twenty years African art (i.e., traditional/classical/old/used African art) has registered solidly upon the academic radar screen. It is now unruffled a regular on the TV cover appearing in the set decoration of series with social and cultural situations as varied as those in The Cosby point out The Hughleys, Frasier, Will & Grace, and the newly come It's All Relative. (I want to make myself exquisitely clear: I tried each of these point out tos only trace, and I didn't inhale.) The picture is comely much the same for now passing museum practices. Unfortunately, in about institutions the African galleries appear to be more like supporting actors than star performers in the museum. Still, for better or worse, African art (although not contemporary African art) has assumed a matter-of-fact neighborhood in the permanent exhibitions of our large encyclopedic museums and in cros cultural temporary exhibitions with a global reach.

The latter was the case with brace recent exhibitions at the British Museum. "The Museum of the Mind: Art and Memory in World Cultures" (April 15-September 7 2003) celebrated the 250th anniversary of the founding of the British Museum and was curated by means of John Mack, Keeper of Ethnography. "Medicine Man: The Forgotten Museum of Henry Wellcome" (June 26-November 16 2003) was soared by the Wellcome Trust to commemorate the 150th anniversary of its namesake's birth and was curated from Ken Arnold and Danielle Olsen the one and the other exhibitions were accompanied by works of the same name. as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but featured collections largely assembled as part of the British colonial experience. Although in principle the agendas of the sum of two units institutions were significantly different, in practice the two assembled encyclopedic holdings that have the appearance to have been the arise of a giant vacuum cleaner sucking up the material agriculture of planet Earth. And to the expansion that memory is viewed today as a significant constituent of one's well-being, both casts dealt with issues of health and the human experience. besides these installations provided a provocative contrast in exhibition strategies.

according to far the more conventional and coherent of the pair was "Museum of the Mind." It followed a clearly delineated path [i]or[/i] part of to the other five carefully defined sections featuring realitys drawn from different time periods and from around the world, on the contrary exclusively from the British Museum's acknowledge collections. The installation opened with a floor-to-ceiling altar in the shape of the museum's portico according to the Mexican artist Eugenio Reye It featured a portrait of Sir Hans Sloane, who originateed the museum with his bequest in 1753 Although looking more like a monumental wedding cake than a reverential altar, the installation was nonetheless an appropriate device to celebrate a 250th anniversary. This first section, titled "The Museum as Theatre of Memory," put the stage not for a history of the British Museum nevertheless rather for the themes of memory and commemoration and in what way the arts serve as permutations of these. Although the ongoing repatriation debates surrounding final causes in the British Museum (eg the Parthenon sculptures) were not addressed in the exhibition, in the accompanying publication John Mack cleverly and thoughtfully positions them in the way that that the negotiation and reclamation of the past are part of the "theatre of memory."

Opposite the altar was the other section and the first of four three-tiered section headers, "aide-memoire/In the Mind's Eye/Object Created as Aids to Memorize," which had the largest concentration of African works. Here the majestic grove figure (ndop) of the Kuba king Shyaam-a-Mbul Ngwoong originator of the Kuba kingdom, was deliberately placed adjacent to a marble portrait of the in the manner of greece dramatist Euripides. The sculpture of the Kuba king was interpreted not just as a simple work of commemoration on the other hand as a document of history that invoked royal genealogies and acts of accomplishment. Also representing mnemonic devices in the exhibition was a Luba lukasa, or "memory board," which helped oral historians recall like things as family histories and refinement heroes. Similarly a pair of Lega ivory figures from the bwami society referenc by-words important to the enlightenment and advancement of initiates within the society. A remarkable Kongo power figure (nkisi) was also conceptually framed within this section; the blades and nails inserted into the figure were fact specific, and the doing and undoing of an oath to the nkisi required powerful acts of memory--quite unlike pre-election promises in the United States, which involve no after acts of memory at all.