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February 18 - August 23, 1999
To Cure and Protect: Sickness and Health in African Art examines the ways sub-Saharan cultures depict health and sickness and how illness was treated by using works of art and utilitarian objects. The exhibit includes 100 objects ranging from sculptures and masks, to amulets, gourds and divination tools that were used as part of healing traditions, both to cure disease and to prevent future illness.
To Cure and Protect is an important link in a chain of exhibitions forged to juxtapose an understanding of health and illness with aesthetic, ethical, knowledge-based, and social experience. The exhibit extends the Museum's commitment to offering opportunities for learning how cultures treat their members in health and illness and to providing a view of the practitioners who observe and treat them.
African countries represented in this exhibition include Angola, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Cote d'Ivoire, The Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Nigeria, Republic of Benin, and Tanzania.
The exhibition is divided into four sections, which together present a picture of sickness and health in African culture. Sections include:
Leadership and the Safeguarding of Health
Many of the most beautiful and well-known sculptures of the sub-Saharan Africa represent idealized images of individuals at the peak of youth and health, embodying a serenity and composure which bespeak both social, physical and mental fitness. Among the finest examples of this type of artwork are those representing male and female ancestors, who are often portrayed in youth, and mother and child figures. Together, these works illustrate the ways in which health is linked to ties with ancestral past and its continuation through family and community.
As images of a social ideal, these artworks are frequently part of a community or a family altar, or are kept under the safeguard of priests or secular leaders. The latter often use them as symbols of authority, as these figures are presumed to represent their ancestors. The main responsibility of the leaders is to safeguard the well being of the members of the community, the domesticated animals and the game, as well as the crops and the fruits.
The exhibition To Cure and Protect: Sickness and Health in African Art was organized by The Museum for African Art in New York City. Pfizer, Inc. provided major support for the exhibition and its public programs in its original form in New York.
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