The Sublime and the Fantastic: African Art from the Faletti Family Collection

May 14—June 28, 1998

This exhibition explored the range and depth of African artistic sensibility through 75 works of sub-Saharan art dating from the sixteenth to early twentieth centuries.

Drawing on African concepts, the contemplative quality of the sublime was illustrated by emblems of leadership, divination materials, and masterworks of devotional worship made from wood, ivory, parchment, and bronze. In contrast, the fantastic was evoked through polychrome spirit masks and altars constructed from juxtapositions of animal and human forms.