The Art of Daily Life Enters its Final Week

Regarded as the finest showcase of Southern African art in recent years, The Art of Daily Life will enter its final week at the Cleveland Museum of Art on February 19. Through some seventy-five works from American private collections and the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art, the exhibition resplendently celebrates the stunning formal diversity and cultural significance of Southern Africa’s artistic heritage. Despite having enjoyed a degree of growing interest and appreciation over the past three decades, the art of indigenous Southern African societies has long been largely neglected. The Art of Daily Life puts the works of these traditions––which so subtly bridge the planes of the mundane and sacred––under a spotlight to receive the recognition they so unreservedly deserve. 

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Staff attributed to the "Baboon Master"   Tsonga, South Africa   19th–20th century

 

Prestige vessel   Nguni, South Africa   19th–20th century

Woman's beaded apron   Nguni, South Africa   19th–20th century

Pipe with anthropomorphic bowl   Sotho or Nguni, Lesotho or South Africa   19th–20th century

Headrest    Shona or Tsonga, Mozambique, South Africa or Zimbabwe   19th–20th century

Images courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art

Tsonga Neckrest - South Africa

The above images depict a rare Tsonga neckrest with carrying handle in the form of a dance staff, the handle of which terminates in an elegant disk-shaped finial often found on North Nguni staffs. The gently curving handle is perfectly carved to allow the end of the handle to rest on the floor surface. South African neckrests with carrying handles are particularly rare.

Carved on the surface of the horizontal support are five parallel rows of fine dots carved in relief. These dots would have formed indentations in the face of the male sleeper, reminiscent of the scarification patterns on North Nguni women. These temporary facial patterns were said to be the source of much amusement.

JacarandaTribal.com