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Charles Derby was a good friend of Paul Rabut who introduced him to the
African Arts.
The Charles Derby Collection
 AR325
African Art,
On and Off the Walls
Featuring Items from the Charles Derby Collection
photos copyright on this page: Charles Derby
Collection of African Art
text by the the Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, Massachusetts 2001
Collecting and Exhibiting African Art
A belief in unseen forces-whether dreams, deities or ancestral
spirits-animates most of the art objects included in this exhibition of works
from sub-Saharan Africa. The works have been collected over the past twenty-two
years by Charles Derby, who has long been interested in the art of tribal
peoples. In the homes or communal spaces of the peoples who created them, these
objects served as intermediaries between the visible, practical world in which
their users lived and the invisible, spiritual one to which they addressed their
aspirations, hopes, awe, and dread. Intended to be used in rituals and
ceremonies-the precise meanings of which may not be altogether understood
today-these objects and others like them have long stimulated admiration and
curiosity in the West.
In the colonial period, many art objects were taken from African lands, as
exotic souvenirs, with little if any documentation. As a consequence, while we
have been able to admire the formal vigor and expressive power of much of the
African art we possess in the West (which usually dates from the 19th and 20th
centuries), we cannot always recover the historical context in which most of it
was either used or created. Like the history of Africa itself, the history of
African art is still being written. Its construction draws upon oral traditions,
early European and Arabic documents, studies in linguistics and archaeology, and
scientific analyses.
In addition to the removal of objects, environmental factors (such as the
damaging effects of climate and insects) account for the loss of much indigenous
historical evidence. Since the 1960s, however, many scholars have engaged in
extensive field work in Africa, augmenting our awareness of such issues as why
an object was made and for what purpose it was intended. In addition to
providing a selective survey of African aesthetic achievement in the visual
arts, we hope in this exhibition to foster an understanding of the uses of these
objects by the diverse cultures in sub-Saharan Africa represented here. The
contextual approach enables us to gain greater insight into the richness and
diversity of the belief systems and aesthetic practices of these African
cultures.
We have organized the objects on view according to the purposes they might have
served, focusing on the categories of masking, fertility, divination, sacred
power, political authority, and textiles. These divisions do not have clearly
demarcated boundaries; many objects had multiple uses. Some sacred power
figures, for example, probably played roles in divination ceremonies; many of
the masks perhaps marked fertility rites or occasions of political significance.
Taken together, however, these groupings provide a useful introduction to the
range of meanings these objects may have held for their creators and for the
communities in which they figured.
Although we know that African artists were highly esteemed, we do not know the
names of any of the artists whose work is presented here. But, for the most
part, we have been able to provide an identification of the peoples who produced
and used the works we are exhibiting. This information, as well as an indication
of the political states in which these peoples currently reside, appears on the
object labels that accompany the works. The necessity for multiple
identifications points up the complexity of modern Africa, whose peoples may
simultaneously identify themselves with a centuries-old tribal culture and a
political state where modern science, technology, and medicine are practiced.
Blanche and Charles Derby loaned these objects to the Museum of Fine Arts,
Springfield, Massachusetts, 220 State Street Springfield, MA Phone:
413-263-6800 - Tty: 413-263-6812 and gave assistance in organizing the
exhibition.
Fertility and 2 sacred power figures from the Charles Derby collection
  
Masking
 Masking
refers to a broad spectrum of ceremonies and beliefs that have traditionally
been practiced in Africa and other parts of the world. To wear a mask and its
associated vestment was to conceal one's own identity in the guise of another.
Whether this other was a spirit, ancestor, or another person-either revered or
feared-the ceremony in which the masked performer participated marked a time of
transition, when otherworldly powers were invoked to aid in human affairs. Masks
played especially important roles in initiation and funerary rites, as markers
of transition when the connections between this world and another were
particularly strong. At such times humans sought to reaffirm the order of their
society by reference to their beliefs and values exemplified by the masks. On
this basis the mask carried the authority demanded by the occasion.
In our society, for the most part, there are no restrictions on who may wear a
mask or what they may masquerade as. But in other cultures this is not the case.
In traditional Africa, in general, only men wore masks, although the mask itself
could be male or female. If permitted to see the masks at all, even in public
appearances, women were required to keep at a safe distance, since masks were
considered dangerous to them. And only men-specialist carvers, blacksmiths,
farmers, or ritual specialists-could make masks.
Masks were worn in three different ways: as face masks, vertically covering the
face; as helmets, encasing the entire head; and as crests, resting upon the
head, which was commonly covered by a pliable, transparent material as part of
the disguise. Examples of these three mask types are included here.
Because they are worn by people and intimately linked to the human body, African
masks are mobile in their indigenous settings. They are animated by movement and
music. Masquerades also impart a dimension of entertainment to the serious
purposes for which they are used.
Since the middle of this century, as the peoples of Africa have modified their
tribal identities in order to organize themselves into modern, independent
nations, masking ceremonies have generally become less integral to Africans' way
of life. But some exceptions-notably funerary masquerades-continue today.
Political authority figures
  
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