Description
Book SynopsisBrings together figurative wood sculptures and ceramic vessels, masks, and elaborate bronze and iron regalia selected to exemplify important typologies within the Benue River Valley
Trade Review". . . to be enjoyed when you are awake and concentrating and hungry for information about some of the strangest and most beautiful images you'll ever see."
-- Holland Cotter * The New York Times *
Table of ContentsForewords--Marla C. Berns and Stephane Martin; A Note from the Director of Museums, National Commission for Museums and Monuments, Nigeria--Nath Mayo Adediran; Preface--Marla C. Berns Introduction: Central Nigeria Unmasked--Marla C. Berns and Richard Fardon Part 1 The Lower Benue: Fluid Artistic Identities 1 Introduction: Reimagining Lower Benue Art History --Sidney Littlefield Kasfir; 2 Idoma Art and the Intersection of Benue Histories and Geographies --Sidney Littlefield Kasfir; Interleaf A Idoma and Tiv Artists--Sidney Littlefield Kasfir; Interleaf B Umale Oganegi, Igala Artist--Susan Picton; 3 The Ancestral Masquerade: A Paradigm of Benue Valley Art History --Sidney Littlefield Kasfir A. The Igala Egwu Afia--John Boston; B. Ebira Masquerade and Its Histories--John Picton; C. Ndako Gboya Masquerades of the Nupe--Constanze Weise; D. Power and Gender in the History of Egungun--John C. Willis; E. Dead Fathers of Okpella--Jean Borgatti; 4 Ebira and the Niger-Benue Confluence: Material Culture and Masquerade; Artifact and Identity Revisited--John Picton; 5 Igala Masquerades and Figure Sculpture--John Boston; 6 Lost-Wax Casting along the Benue--Nancy Neaher Maas; Interleaf C A Note on the "Igala" Bell--Nancy Neaher Maas; Interleaf D A Note on Idoma Bells and Smoking Pipes--Sidney Littlefield Kasfir Part 2 The Middle Benue: Visual Resemblances, Connected Histories 7 Introduction: The Middle Benue--Richard Fardon; 8 The Quick and the Dead: Versatile Wooden Figures from the Middle Benue--Richard Fardon; Interleaf E Wurbo Jukun Sculpture from the Taraba and Wase River Valleys --Marla C. Berns; 9 A Memoir: The Jukun of the Middle Benue with a Brief Entry on the Goemai--Arnold Rubin; 10 Hybrids: Theranthropic Horizontal Masquerades from the Middle Benue--Richard Fardon; Interleaf F Mining the Rubin Archive: Mid-Twentieth-Century Documentation of Two Mumuye Masquerades--Susan Elizabeth Gagliardi; 11 Seen or Heard? Masquerades That Cry and Figures That Talk among the Mumuye--Mette Bovin; Interleaf G Heavy Metal: The Prestige of Iron in the Middle Benue --Richard Fardon; 12 Kantana, Kulere, and Their Neighbors South of the Jos Plateau --Barbara Frank; Interleaf H A Myriad of Mangam Masks--Marla C. Berns; 13 Embodiments Large and Small: Sacred Wood Sculpture of the Wurkun and Bikwin--Joerg Adelberger; 14 Enigmatic Embodiments: Vertical Masks in Cross-Cultural Perspective--Marla C. Berns Part 3 The Upper Benue: Expressive and Ritual Capacities of Clay 15 Introduction to Upper Benue Arts--Marla C. Berns; 16 Modeling Therapies: Vessels for Healing and Protection in the Western Gongola Valley--Marla C. Berns; 17 Containing Power: Identities in Clay in the Eastern Gongola Valley, the Ga'anda--Marla C. Berns; 18 Containing Power: Identities in Clay in the Eastern Gongola Valley, the 'Bena, Yungur, and Dera--Marla C. Berns; Interleaf I Vestiges in Wood: Ancestor Sculptures of the Eastern Gongola Valley --Marla C. Berns Epilogue Making the Market for Benue Arts: Notes on the French Connection --Helene Joubert Notes to the Text; References Cited; Index; Contributors
