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Art of Central Africa at the Indianapolis Museum of Art

2018; UCLA James S. Coleman African Studies Center; Volume: 51; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1162/afar_a_00431

1937-2108

Constantine Petridis, Kirstin Gotway,

African history and culture studies

In terms of arts and entertainment, Indianapolis, Indiana, is known for its automobile race, its International Violin Competition, and the Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields (IMA). African art scholars and aficionados alike associate the city and its museum specifically with businessman and philanthropist Harrison Eiteljorg (1903–1997), the namesake of the museum's suite of African art galleries (Fig. 1). To this day, his vast collection, mostly donated in 1989, constitutes the bulk of the museum's more than 1,700 African holdings, making it among the largest of its kind in the country and one of the few truly encyclopedic African collections anywhere in the world (Figs. 2–3).1 Thanks to his vision and the efforts of the museum's longtime (and now emeritus) curator Theodore (Ted) Celenko, it collected and exhibited the arts of northern Africa and contemporary African art long before many other museums or private collectors (see jegede 2000). As a result, these two areas, as well as the often equally underrated arts of eastern and southern Africa, are exceptionally well represented. Due largely to the accomplishments of its curator of textile and fashion arts, Niloo Paydar, the museum also has a strong reputation for its comprehensive collection of African textiles, administratively housed in another department.It has often been said that Eiteljorg regularly benefited from the advice of Indiana University professor Roy Sieber (1923–2001), a leading authority in the field and an influential mentor to many. But the true nature of Sieber's role in forming the Eiteljorg Collection has not been fully studied, and therefore it cannot be ascertained which acquisitions Sieber actually supported. However, as he himself pointed out in an article on the collection in this journal, Celenko did impact “Eiteljorg's orientation and level of seriousness” (Celenko 1981: 32). From his beginnings as Eiteljorg's private curator in 1978 until his retirement on March 31, 2009, after nearly twenty years as the Indianapolis Museum of Art's curator of the Arts of Africa, the South Pacific, and the Americas, Celenko steered the collection to its current constitution.2 Still, many important works in the museum's African collection pre- and postdate the Eiteljorg gifts, and some of the collection's most prized possessions were purchased during the last decade before Celenko retired, including the ex–Susan Vogel Senufo display figure (1999.31; see Robbins and Nooter 1989: 121, no. 169; Lee 2005: 70) and the ex–Carlo Monzino Songye power figure (2005.21), which I discuss later.My impetus for writing this essay was my engagement as the Mellon Curator-at-Large for African Art at the IMA from July 1, 2014, to October 1, 2015. Appointed by Charles L. Venable, the Indianapolis museum's Melvin & Bren Simon Director and CEO, I served as one of six nonresident curators of various art historical specialties in this ambitious and innovative curatorial pilot program supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which was initiated in November 2011 and ended in June 2017. Through the Mellon curatorial program, the IMA was able to draw on the expertise of specialists in areas where in-house curatorial oversight was lacking, including Chinese, South Asian, Native American, African, American, and Japanese art. All Mellon curators, typically hired on a rotating basis for one-year tenures, have benefited from the expert assistance of Kirstin Krause Gotway, now undertaking PhD studies in art history at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.In line with a museum-wide assessment project, chief among the tasks assigned to me were the ranking of the collection according to quality and the updating of catalogue data accompanying the works identified as of the highest ranks, to support further research and the ultimate publication of a scholarly catalogue of collection highlights. On a more practical level, ranking the collection, following a predetermined system of criteria for quality and excellence, would also help determine which objects might be removed from the galleries and ultimately considered for deaccessioning.3 However, early in my involvement with the collection I concluded that its quality is quite uneven, due to its size, scope, origins, and development. My preliminary assessment, which will need to be confirmed by an independent second opinion and maybe even a third opinion, has led to a hierarchical distinction into four quality levels from A to D.In my opinion, out of more than 1,700 items, the number of truly excellent or extraordinary works, which I have labeled as of the A rank, is limited to perhaps twenty-five objects, a dozen of which are masterworks of so-called classical or historical African art. About 260 of the 1,700 are I believe of the B rank, denoting a quality continuum that ranges from good to very fine. Of course, this should not come as a surprise if one takes into account the donor's collecting practice and what I would label his omnivorous and rather compulsive collecting habits. Indeed, it is known that Harrison Eiteljorg—whose donation of nearly 1,200 works to the IMA constitutes 70% of its entire African collection—purchased the majority of what he owned in bulk and mostly from African dealers who paid him annual visits in Indianapolis and ensured that during a given year his collection would grow by the hundreds. While this situation surely contributed to the collection's comprehensive and encyclopedic character, it also explains its inconsistency. Indeed, it appears that Eiteljorg was more concerned about the quantity of his African holdings than about their quality.This brief survey primarily functions as a prelude to the much-needed updated and in-depth analysis of the museum's rich and varied collection, ideally in the format of a volume that assembles specialists’ viewpoints through extensive entries on single objects. While there are various areas of the IMA's African collection that also merit attention, partly because of my own personal interest and expertise, I focus here on a number of key works of the A and B ranks from present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo and adjacent regions, although there are other areas of the museum's African collection that are equally worthwhile.4 The fact that many of these objects have been featured in a number of publications, including several by Ted Celenko and the encyclopedic African Art in American Collections by Warren Robbins and Nancy Ingram Nooter, may suggest that they are in fact generally considered to be among the highlights of the IMA's African art collection. However, there are major works of “traditional” art from other parts of the continent in the collection as well, such as a marvelous Gabonese Fang figurine of the Okak subgroup (Fig. 4) that was featured on the cover of Celenko's A Treasury of African Art from the Harrison Eiteljorg Collection (1983: 177, cat. 159; see also Celenko 1980: cat. 41, 1981: 38, fig. 11; Robbins and Nooter 1989: 384, no. 982). Eiteljorg purchased this sculpture on November 16, 1976, from Ismaila Sibi, a Senegalese dealer based in New York City who was the source of some of Eiteljorg's best acquisitions of that time.Starting in northwestern Congo, Figure 5 is a face mask that has been tentatively attributed to the Ngbaka. In addition to a number of other works illustrated in this essay, this mask—published in François Neyt's Arts traditionnels et histoire au Zaïre (1981: 22, fig. 1.3)—was purchased by Eiteljorg from California-based Belgian dealer Jacques Hautelet (1931–2014) on June 8, 1983. Interestingly, in the museum files, on the back of a studio photo of the mask is a handwritten note dated June 1980 by the famed Belgian artist and African art collector Jean [Willy] Mestach (1926–2014), stating that he owned this sculpture in the 1950s and sold it to fellow Belgian collectors Paul and Luisa Muller-Vanisterbeek in the 1960s. Although most masks from the Ubangi region in northwestern Congo are attributed to the Ngbaka, they may in fact also have been made by the Mbanza (Mbanja). Scholars have suggested that initiations and masks may have been borrowed and adapted by the Ngbaka from the Mbanza (Burssens 1993: 218–21; Grootaers 2007: 57). Both groups use masks in the context of initiation, commonly called gaza. Because Ngbaka and Mbanza are so closely related, it is impossible to distinguish their masks without additional primary data. The masks were typically worn by instructors or possibly even by newly initiated boys when they performed dances to celebrate the latter's release from seclusion and their reintegration into the community. The cultural diversity of the region is reflected in the existence of a variety of mask styles, but simian-shaped sculptures such as this example are very rare.One of the IMA's most recent African purchases is a lidded container carved by the Zande chief and artist Songo (Fig. 6). It was acquired at the Sotheby's, New York, sale of the collection of William W. Brill (1918–2003) on November 17, 2005. What is especially interesting in addition to the fact that it is a signed (pyro-engraved) work by a known historical artist—something rather unusual within the corpus of so-called tradition-based, classic, or historical art of sub-Saharan Africa—is that we know that it was acquired by a Belgian colonial called Mr. Castelain before 1911 in the village of Rungu in the “Bomokandi zone” of the Uele region, and that it was originally owned by what is today called the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren, Belgium (traces of the Tervuren registration number MCB 3370 can still be seen on the container's lid). As confirmed by then-Tervuren museum curator Boris Wastiau in personal correspondence with Ted Celenko in November 2006, it was deaccessioned in 1974 from that museum through exchange with Morton Lipkin (1926–2012) of Lipkin Gallery in London, who sold it to Brill in New York on February 15 of the same year (see also Wastiau 2008: 122). It remained in the Brill Collection until its sale at the the popular Mangbetu-style rendering of the head with its skull elongation and typical hairdo, containers like the IMA's have also been (erroneously) labeled in the past as Mangbetu, including in the Sotheby's catalogue for the Brill sale in 2006 (p. 124, lot 115). Regardless of the stylistic affinity between some of the arts of the two peoples, I believe attributing such boxes to the “Zande-Mangbetu” may create the false impression of an ethnic conglomerate. The practice of skull deformation was common among different peoples in this vast region; in other words, this feature alone cannot be used as an ethnic marker.Featured in the publications of Neyt (1981: 44, fig. II.15) and Celenko (1983: 183, fig. 165), is a very fine example of the rare figures of Metoko origin (Fig. 8) (see also Felix 1987: 111, fig. 6; Robbins and Nooter 1989: 490, no. 1269) that was sold by Hautelet to Eiteljorg on September 8, 1982. Metoko figures are Sotheby's auction. What has not been explained is the second term following the name Songo in the engraved inscription on the IMA's box: dekvoi. Not only is the word not deciphered and not understood, it does not seem to be in the Zande language.5 The artist Songo (Fig. 7) was a chief of the Vungara (Avongara) “royal clan,” and he was equally famous for his wood sculptures and ivory carvings. His distinct style is especially recognizable in the way he rendered his figures’ facial features. In addition to bark and wooden boxes, ivory objects, and statues, he created incised drawings on gourds and calabashes, including depictions of Europeans derived from magazine illustrations. Songo and a number of his contemporaries most likely started to sign their work in response to commissions by Europeans.Bark boxes or containers like the IMA's example made by Songo were used among different cultures in a vast region to store jewelry, cosmetics, trinkets, and other precious items, as well as magical potions. In more recent times they were also used as wallets for European currency. The carved human head as a finial on the container's lid—undoubtedly adding to the object's appeal as a status indicator and exponent of court art—is probably a more recent innovation in the decorative arts of both Zande and Mangbetu, likely stimulated by the interest in figurative art on the part of foreign—that is, European—visitors and travelers in the region since the early twentieth century (Schildkrout and Keim 1990: 244–57). Because of the influence of stylistically related to those of their Lengola neighbors, while the contextual settings of the art of both peoples are closely related to those of the Lega people. Open to male and, to a lesser extent, female members, Bukota was the name of the hierarchically organized association that, like Bwami among the Lega, governed social, political, and religious life among the Metoko and the Lengola (Biebuyck 1977: 52–53, 1995). Figures—often occurring in male-female pairs—were primarily used in the Bukota's secret initiations, and they were among the various ritual objects that were the exclusive possession of high-ranking association members. Signaling power and status, figures were also used in circumcision rites and funerary ceremonies, as well as for peacemaking. The sculptures would have carried a name referring to actual historical individuals who were remembered for their exceptional behavior or noteworthy accomplishments. It is not clear whether the same figures are used in these different contexts. The collective name kakungu is given to large figures that are placed within a rectangular construction on the tomb of high-ranking Bukota initiates, but it cannot be confirmed if the IMA's sculpture is an example of this category. Such figures served as temporary dwellings for the souls of deceased association members.An excellent example of a Lega mask (Fig. 9) was acquired by Belgian collector and Lega art expert Nicolas de Kun in the village of Kambondo in 1960 (see Celenko 1980: cat. 49; 1983: 185, cat. 167). It was purchased by the then California-based collector and dealer Herbert Baker—who already owned it when it was exhibited at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City in 1966—and sold to Harrison Eiteljorg on October 11, 1977. Masks of different materials, shapes, and sizes were among the many objects used in the initiations of the Bwami association (Biebuyck 2002: 17–21, 65–67, 98–100; see also Cameron 2001: 40–47, 178–219). A hierarchically organized institution, Bwami unified the different Lega groups that lived dispersed in numerous small villages in the densely forested regions of eastern Congo. The association's ultimate goal was to instruct its members in a complicated and all-encompassing moral philosophy that brought enlightenment and wisdom. Masks and a wide variety of other manmade artworks, as well as more common artifacts and natural objects, were used as didactic devices to convey the Bwami's teachings in the course of sequential initiations. These items served to visually illustrate the proverbs that transmitted the association's philosophical precepts to the initiates. The presentation of objects and recitation of proverbs would be accompanied by music, song, dance, gestures, and real theater. Rarely, however, were masks attached in front of the face to disguise the identity of their wearer. Instead, they were “worn” on the arms or other body parts, held in the hands, piled in stacks, hung on fences, or even dragged on the ground. This large, white-colored mask is from one of five basic categories, called idumu, meaning “ancestor”; it would have originally carried a beard of long strands of raffia.Included in the 1981 overview of the Eiteljorg Collection (Celenko 1981: 41, fig. 17) and in the 2005 publication of highlights of the IMA's collection (Lee 2005: 82), a delicately carved, elegant female figure in the most classical Luba style (Fig. 10) was probably once part of a spear rather than of a staff, as others have also suggested (see Celenko 1983: 214, cat. 195). Eiteljorg purchased the figure on November 16, 1976, from Ismaila Sibi, the Senegalese dealer based in New York City who was one of Eiteljorg's main purveyors in the collection's genesis and the source of, among others, the earlier-mentioned Fang figure (Fig. 4). Spears were among the most sacred regalia of the Luba king's treasury (Roberts and Roberts 1996: 65, cat. 16, and 76, cat. 26; 2007: 129, pls. 28–29). Used in investiture rituals as a symbol of the authority and legitimacy of its royal owner, a spear was planted in the soil next to the stool and opposite the staff of office, two other important pieces of Luba regalia. It was also used in a dance that commemorated the mythological foundation of the Luba kingdom. The figure's typical posture with the hands to the breasts refers to a classical iconographic scheme indicating that Luba women protect and uphold the prohibitions of kingship. The wear and patina of this figure's face and body—with almost entirely eroded relief designs imitating scarifications on the torso—reflect long-term use and handling. Luba spears are seldom encountered in Western collections. Most probably this is due to both to their rarity—the fact that they were exclusively owned by sacred kings—and the secrecy that surrounded them while they were in use. They were typically wrapped in white cloth and only exposed during special ceremonies.A Janus caryatid stool in the Zela style, sold by the late Iris Silverman (1931–1980) of Baum & Silverman in Los Angeles to Harrison Eiteljorg on October 20, 1977, is perhaps the finest example of this extremely rare object (Fig. 11)—as suggested by its inclusion in the publications of Felix (1987: 205, fig. 1) and Robbins and Nooter (1989: 459, no. 1186; see also Celenko 1981: 33, fig. 2; 1983: 216–17, cat. 197). Celenko learned from Belgian dealer and art expert Louis de Strycker (letter of July 30, 1979) that this work was featured in an article in the magazine Le Congo illustré by German-Belgian ethnologist and Africa researcher Burkhart Waldecker (1947). From the figure caption in Waldecker's text it appears that the stool, originally bearing the inventory number 167, was once in the collection of the museum under his stewardship, the Musée Léopold II in what is now Lubumbashi; it closed in 1961 (see also Couttenier 2014). The publication indicates that the stool was named kipona kya bankishi, which translates as “stool of the spirits” (Waldecker 1947: 5, fig. 10). The ethnic name Zela that has been assigned to this stool and various other Luba-style works—after prior attributions to the Holoholo and still other Luba-related groups—is little understood. A stool in a style similar to the IMA's, then in a private collection, was identified as “northern Hemba” in François Neyt's classic publication on the Hemba (1977: 4 93, figs. 90–91). Like the Hemba's, the culture and arts of the Zela are closely related to those of the Luba proper, in typology and iconography, as well as in meaning and function. Stools similar to this example have thus been associated with the leadership examples more commonly studied among the Luba. Some firsthand sources, as summarized by Neyt (1981: 316) and Felix (1987: 204), have noted, however, that the representation of male-female pairs incarnating ancestors is a signature feature of Zela art.A single caryatid stool was also sold by Iris Silverman (Baum & Silverman) to Harrison Eiteljorg on October 20, 1977 (Fig. 12). We know nothing more about the prior collection history of the work. The same holds true, however, for a closely related example in a private collection, which also saw its first public appearance in the West in 1977 (Neyt 1977: 495, fig. 93).6 Despite an earlier proposition to assign a Bangubangu label to the IMA stool, Zula seems to be the generally accepted attribution (see also Celenko 1981: 42, fig. 19; 1983: 218–19, cat. 198; Felix 1987: 211, fig. 1). The Zula are Luba-related people who live in proximity to both the Hemba and the Kusu. Most Zula-style sculptures would have been destroyed as a result of an iconoclastic Islamic movement in the late nineteenth century. Anthropomorphic stools, supported by squatting or seated female caryatids, are said to be the only objects that survived. Enhanced with iron rings around the wrists and ankles and decorated with brass tacks, such stools served as prestige items of male leaders and dignitaries. The supporting female figure—featuring an elaborate coiffure and a body graced with scarification patterns in high relief—has been identified as the image of an ancestor who acted as the seat of power on which the authority of its male owner rested (cf. Roberts and Roberts 2015).When the IMA purchased an imposing Songye figure (Fig. 13) through private sale from Sotheby's, New York, on September 15, 2005, its provenance could be traced back only to the mid-1980s, when it was in the reputed collection of Carlo Monzino (1931–1996) in Italy. We do not know where or from whom Monzino had acquired it, but the work was featured in Susan Vogel's traveling exhibition African Aesthetics (1986: 179–80, cat. 129). After Monzino's death, the figure appeared at the Sotheby's, New York, auction (lot 198) on May 19, 2001, and was bought by New York-based collector and dealer Jacques Mallet (1945–2001), who kept it until it was purchased by the IMA in 2005. In a 2013 article in the bulletin of the Belgian Royal Academy for Overseas Sciences, I stumbled on a field photograph in the Congo showing this particular figure (Fig. 14)—with much of its original dress intact (Raymaekers 2013: 257, fig. 7). Raymaekers's text discusses the Museum of Art and Folklore in Luluabourg (now Kananga) in what was then the Belgian Congo, and its founding director Paul Timmermans (1931–1976), a graduate in African languages and cultures from Ghent University, Belgium, who upon his departure from the Congo became an educator at the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren. It was Timmermans who in 1959 photographed this Songye figure in a village called Nkoto Mase among the Songye Kalebwe subgroup and apparently exported it to Belgium shortly thereafter. Interestingly, the collector kept extensive notes about the figure's meaning and functions and even informs us that it carried the proper name Yankima. This kind of firsthand data is rarely available for works held in Western collections, making Timmermans's documentation extremely valuable. In more general terms, based on the writings of Dunja Hersak (esp. 2010, 2013b), this is a prime example of a community power figure for use by an entire village, as suggested by its visual impact and workmanship. The raffia skirt around the waist and the feather headdress are indicators of leadership, while the metal appliqué covering the face refers to the blacksmith, a culture hero celebrated in a Songye myth of state formation.7A classic example of the rare genre of Kanyok headrests (Fig. 15) was purchased by Harrison Eiteljorg from Iris Silverman (Baum & Silverman) on October 20, 1977. In addition to its inclusion in Celenko's publications on the Eiteljorg Collection (e.g. 1980: cat. 47; 1981: 41, fig. 18; 1983: 212, cat. 193), this outstanding sculpture was also published by Felix (1987: 51, fig. 7) and Robbins and Nooter (1989: 433, no. 1118). The figure's facial features and its particular hairstyle reveal its Kanyok origin. More specifically, its style and finish place it in the so-called court art of the Kanyok people in the town of Kand-Kand, where it was the work of a court sculptor bearing the title manindak (see Ceyssens 2001, 2006). The depicted coiffure was locally called tuzaaz and consisted of countless tufts of hair and a little plait at the back of the neck. Like the culturally related neighboring Luba, the Kanyok considered elaborate hairdos and scarifications as signs of beauty. Confined to the lower belly and the thighs, such permanent skin decorations were valued not only because of their visual appeal but also and even more because of their tactile nature, which had obvious sexual connotations. The elongation of the labia had the same effect; genital transformations enhanced the sexual appeal of the woman's body. In addition to its practical purpose as a pillow meant to protect a woman's often elaborate hairstyle, such a caryatid headrest also signaled the taste, status, and wealth of its owner.A fine example of the Luluwa figure genre known as lupingu lwa bwimpe or bwanga bwa bwimpe (Fig. 16) was purchased by Harrison Eiteljorg from Jacques Hautelet on June 8, 1983. Regrettably, nothing is known about the work's prior collection history, but it was possibly previously owned by Paul Timmermans or his brother Karel, who are both well known for the collections of Luluwa materials they established—Paul also having published an important scholarly article on the subject with lasting merits (see Timmermans 1966). The figurine is also reproduced as a characteristic representative of this particular genre of Luluwa sculpture in François Neyt's often-cited survey book (1981: 188, fig. IX.4). Based on the type of headdress, the origin of this figure can specifically be located near the Beena Tshadi villages of Tshikoy and Tshinguvu. Luluwa power figures of the bwimpe type depict a standing woman holding a cup in one hand, with an elaborately decorated body with curvilinear and geometric scarification marks (Petridis 2011, 2015). Figures imitating these beautifications were part of a cult meant to foster and protect the fertility of a woman and/or the health of her newborn. The particular name given to these figures denoted beauty as a sign of moral virtue as it was expressed in the physical perfection of the human body. As in real life, the figure's skin was coated with a mixture of red earth, white chalk, and oils.One of a number of culturally related masks that Harrison Eiteljorg purchased from Jacques Hautelet on September 16, 1983, is an exceedingly rare Lwalu wooden mask entirely covered with copper plates (Fig. 17)—reproduced in the publications of both Neyt (1981: 204, fig. X.4) and Felix (1987: 95, fig. 5). The four different types of full wooden versions of Lwalu masks were worn during the dry season by a young bachelor in dances with age-mates; they toured neighboring villages and performed in exchange for a free meal and drinks, hoping to attract the attention of a future spouse. It is not impossible that a copper-covered mask, prior to being bedecked with metal, could have had an earlier existence as a wooden dance mask. The Western Lwalu called a copper-covered mask like this one in the IMA's collection ngongo wa shimbungu, referring to a homonymous association whose responsibility it was to address disputes and minor misdemeanors, such as theft and adultery (Ceyssens 1993: 366–67).An Eastern Pende face mask (Fig. 18), another acquisition from Iris Silverman (Baum & Silverman) on October 20, 1977, is one of the most exquisite Eastern Pende-style sculptures in a Western collection, its original dusty red surface unusually intact (Celenko 1981: 39, fig. 14; 1983: 203, cat. 183). The mask is an example of a genre called Kindombolo, which ironically represented the antiaesthetic and grotesque in Pende thought. Proper to a trickster character, the mask had its pendant among the Central Pende in a character by the name of tundu, whose performance was greeted by the crowd with the exclamation “You are ugly!” (Strother 1998: 208–11; 2008: 104, pls. 1–2; 2016). The holes on the mask's cheeks evoked the scars of smallpox. Expressing a philosophy of ugliness, the character portrayed by the mask was considered a survivor of the potentially fatal disease who was, as a result, oblivious to both physical danger and social etiquette. Providing comic relief for the audience, his entertaining dance was characterized by outrageous and often vulgar behavior charged with sexual innuendo or explicit coital pantomiming. Although wearing a so-called village mask that was meant to divert and amuse the public, the Kindombolo masquerader was armed with one or two whips to threaten the onlookers and keep the dance floor clear. Kindombolo also appeared in the boys’ initiation camp to police the young initiates.A helmet-shaped mask (Fig. 19), representing Kwese art in Neyt's survey book (1981: 149, fig. VII.13), acquired by Eiteljorg from Hautelet on October 31, 1983, is without question one of the finest and best-preserved examples of this particular type of mask in a Western collection. A rare occurrence in museum collections in the United States, such masks belong to an interethnic style tradition and exemplify what some scholars have labeled a regional style (e.g. Bascom 1969: 104–5, Bourgeois 1990). The carved imitation of a local hairdo known as mukoto (or a phonetic variant of that name) is among the hallmarks shared by various peoples in southwestern Democratic Republic of the Congo. In fact, since their arts in general and masks in particular are hard to differentiate from those of some of their neighbors, including the Pindi and the Western Pende, these designations should not be taken too literally. Because the sharing of ideas and objects is what typifies the ethnic mélange of the area, the ascription of ethnic divisions between masks may create the false impression of distinction and separation, whereas, in truth, boundaries are porous and ethnic identities fluid.Very little is known about the Kwese and their art—Daniel Biebuyck has summarized the scant documentation on the subject in The Arts of Zaire (1985: 252–54). The unmistakable relationship between the Kwese and the Western Pende also transpires from unpublished notes and field photographs that Nestor Seeuws (1927–2011), one of the first curat