Bamana: the art of existence in Mali - exhibition preview - various artists, African art, Museum for African Art, New York and Museum Rietberg, Zurich

African Arts, Winter, 2001 by Jean-Paul Colleyn, Laurie Ann Farrell

Bamanaya also goes far beyond the relatively arbitrary boundaries of ethnic identity. Symbolic representations and art forms of the Bamana initiation societies are found among the Soninke (including the Marka), the Mandinka, the Bozo, and other neighboring peoples. The New York and Zurich exhibitions cover a large area of Mali where jow are encountered and where a common language, Mandinka-Bamana, is spoken--although in different dialectical forms or as a second language (among the Minianka and Senufo (3)).

The early ethnography on this part of Africa is French, based on the work of Marcel Griaule (1898-1956) and his followers, who saw in a codified mythology the foundation chart for Sudanese cultures (Dieterlen 1957; Zahan 1974). Later, Claude Meillassoux, Jean-Loup Amselle, and Jean Bazin called into question many of the early categories of mythology and cosmology and pointed the way toward a more pragmatic anthropology. Since the early seventies the Mande-Bamana world has been studied by American scholars, often trained in disciplines in addition to or other than anthropology, such as linguistics (Charles Bird), Islamic studies (Nehemia Levtzion), history (John O. Hunwick, David C. Conrad), and art history (James T. Brink, Rene A. Bravmann, Kate Ezra, Patrick McNaughton, Mary Jo Arnoldi, Sarah Brett-Smith). These scholars have enriched anthropological research by paying close attention to the contextualization of oral texts and recognizing a more flexible cosmology than that described by the French school of ethnography. Several of them have contributed to the exhibition catalogue, to which anthropologist and Bamana initiate Salia Male brings his specific expertise.

THE EXHIBITION

The New York and Zurich exhibitions are conceptually the same, following the organization of the catalogue. With the videos, Catherine De Clippel's photographs, taken in Mali over the last twenty years or so, provide a context for the art objects and convey the vitality of the culture. Visitors walk through sections on social and religious aspects of Bamana culture. The journey progresses from the public arena to the most sacred and secret levels, from the clear to the obscure.

Public Life

When entering a Bamana village, one is immediately confronted with an array of striking visual images seen in architecture, sculpture, and applied arts. Both exhibitions begin with photographs of the architecture, including houses and community structures (Figs. 4-6), and examples of household arts, among them doors with figural locks, stools, heddle pulleys, and ceramics (Fig. 7). These are open to public view. This section also includes various representations of leadership through photographs of secular and religious officials along with symbols of authority, such as hunters' jackets and staffs (Figs. 2, 3).

[FIGURES 2-7 OMITTED]

Masks and Puppets of the Village Association

The village association (ton) comprises female and male divisions and is organized according to age groups (flan-bolow). One enters the ton after circumcision and leaves it at the age of about thirty-five. Every year the ton organizes a festival of theatrical performances in the village square. These include koteba and the puppets known as sogo bo in a succession of light-hearted sketches that satirize aspects of Bamana social and religious life. Prior to the public performances, ton members parade through the village streets accompanying masks (sogow) such as Ngon and Ntomo (Figs. 8, 9). Sogobaw (big beasts) resemble small mobile theaters with a head and a wood-frame body (e.g., Fig. 10). Small puppets, expertly manipulated, emerge from the back of this "beast" (Figs. 11, 12).