NON-WESTERN ART IN THE MUSEUM: APPRECIATION OR APPROPRIATION?
Exhibition of non-Western objects as art in Western museums is problematic, because it objectifies, instrumentalizes and appropriates non-Western objects. Purposes and the ways in which non-Western objects have been displayed change over time. In the pre-modern period, non-Western objects were collected and displayed together in cabinets of curiosities because they were perceived to be ‘exotic’ and ‘wondrous’(Clifford). In the enlightenment period, the objects were valued for their informativeness rather than their ‘exotic’ qualities. The objects were collected and classified as instruments which could help the scientific naturalists explain a universal story of human history in which the West enjoys a superior economic and cultural position whereas ‘primitive’ others are representative of early developmental stages of the civilization of mankind (Clifford, 228). The twentieth century witnessed the re-valuation of non-Western objects both for their ethnographic value and their aesthetic qualities (Clifford, 228) and thus, non-Western objects started to be displayed as art. Even though exhibition practices evolved over time , the asymmetry of power between the displayer and the displayed still persists This paper will examine the problematique of the display of non-Western objects as art in a historical context.
The cabinets of curiosities in late 16th and early 17th century mark the beginning of the exhibition practices that then continued for centuries. These cabinets were wooden cabinets in which a myriad of material objects and living creatures, such as sea shells and mermaids, that were collected from exotic foreign lands for the most part were displayed. With the start of the Renaissance era, scholarly attention began to diverge from divine matters to secular matters, which rendered nature and her wonders a main source of curiosity for the West. The possession of the marvelous objects was a sign of status, wealth and power. A cultivated system, which included selecting ‘good’ objects, acquiring knowledge about them and classifying them, developed (Clifford, 220) . What is significant about this period is that these cabinets of curiosities represented a microcosm in which each object came to represent an entire population or region. The problem of representation and the designation of non-Western people and their material heritage as an object of study, a topic of inquiry, continued to a greater extent in the following centuries
The display of the objects in public museums beginning in the eighteenth century reflected the shift in the paradigms of display. With the flourishment of the scientific taxonomy during the Enlightenment period, collections were separated as works of art or works of science, and displayed in specialized museums. The objects were no longer confined to small cabinets with a limited audience anymore, but were put on display in large galleries and museums that are open to public. With the nationalization of royal galleries in the 18th century, museums became a learning environment for the public. (Bennett) However, within this didactic framework an imperial discourse was constructed. Through the display of the objects from the rest of the world, the visitor was directed to compare the object with the Western art and reaffirm the Western superiority. The labels, the arrangement and the way that the objects were displayed were methods used to create this discourse. For example, in the Enlightenment Gallery in British Museum, there is a section named “Trade and Discovery”. The use of a word such as “discovery” suggests that those cultures and lands did not exist until the Western explorers found them. Furthermore, the description of the section reads:
“Colonization of new lands, a constant feature of human history, accelerated during the Enlightenment. Explorers and natural historians surveyed lands that were new to the West, identifying trading opportunities and making scientific observations.”
This statement not only normalizes the systematic classification of the colonized people, but also justifies it. This systematic classification was developed by Augustus Pitt Rivers, an archeologist, who arranged objects according to typologies and chronology in mid-nineteenth century. His arrangement system became popular with the influence of the theory of evolution at the end of the 19th century. River’s arrangement aimed to show a history of human development, where the cultures, of which the ‘exotic’ objects came from were at the lower stages, and Europe at the top. (Clifford, 228). The exhibition practices during this period favoring European civilizations and debasing others, illustrate the framework of cultural imperialism, which lead to invalidation and ultimately elimination of the epistemologies in the colonized regions.
In the early twentieth century, the changing perceptions in anthropology and culture affected the value assigned to the non-Western objects. From an anthropological point of view, they were valued as ethnographic evidences of a culture. (Clifford, 228) On the other hand, with the growing popularity of ‘primitive’ art among the surrealists, the objects considered to be ‘exotic’, ‘primitive’ and ‘tribal’ were seen as art, rather than artifacts. (Clifford,228) Surrealists who appreciated purely aesthetic qualities of the non-Western objects drew affinities between those objects and their surrealist movement, and whereby appropriated the aesthetic qualities of those objects into their own works of art (Errington). With the rising appreciation for the ‘primitive’ objects, their location changed from ethnographic evidence to fine art, in a museum. However, it did not eradicate the representation problems and the hegemonic discourse that have already existed; it also introduced the problem of appropriation.
From the microcosm of cabinets of curiosities to Pitt River’s evolutionary typologies and the arrangement of the objects by culture in today’s museums, there exists an inherent problem of asymmetry of power that leads to misrepresentation of non-Western cultures. The act of selecting one object and displaying it as a representative of an entire population or geography implies the following assumptions: there is a Western ‘subject’, who is in this case the curator, and capable of defining what is valuable, recognizing that value in non-Western ‘objects’ and gives them an ‘identity’ and a place in history by displaying them in a museum setting. The geographical and cultural identities that are constructed in the museums eradicate the cultural differences and nuances as is evident in the example of the Sainsbury gallery in the British Museum. The statements such as ‘African textile’ and ‘African masks’ suggests that there is uniformity and homogeneity among artistic traditions and cultures across Africa. These generalized statements such as ‘African continent’ discredits the cultural diversity. For example, the ‘Religion’ section in the Sainsbury Gallery does not feature objects that are from Christian or Muslim African communities, rather it features objects that are associated with the indigenous religions, such as Yoruba and Igbo, that reflect the encoded perceptions about African religions as seen by Westerners as ‘magical’ and ‘tribal’. (Clifford,197)
Although today’s museums display methods vary to a great extent, the voice of the museum institution in the exhibitions is still dominant and it perpetuates hegemonic narratives. Svetlana Alpers argues for the agency of the visitor, who in her opinion has the critical lens to read beyond the narration provided by the curator (Alpers). However, her argument does not extend to the general audience. Museums have a didactic mission and the knowledge they present is perceived to be ‘objective’. When labels only give the date, name, location, and a brief description from a third person voice and do not include information on how the object was acquired and the significance of the object for the local population it came from, the visitors only hear the voice of the exhibitor, which conveys messages that are on the museum’s agenda. Thus, they take the information in the museum at face-value, and rarely question the purposes and methods of display.
When non-Western objects are presented as art in a museum setting, there are two ethical questions that needs to be addressed: whether the objects are treated as equals to Western works of art, and whether the exhibition pays the due respect to the object’s original function and its maker’s intention. With regards to the former question, the curator’s intention in choosing a particular object matters. What type of objects are valued and are the objects solely valued for their aesthetic properties? As Shelly Errington argues, with the popularization of the ‘primitive art’ by surrealists, for an object to dwell in a fine arts museum it needs to fit ‘primitive’ art category. First and foremost, ‘primitive’ art is a Western construction that resulted from the reclassification of the functional objects as art. As to the selection among the ‘primitive’ objects for display, their transportability and the durability of their materials matter, which explains why objects like ivory masks are displayed broadly compared to other ritual figures made of ephemeral material. (Errington, 206) One way to to understand what was influential in selection and display of a particular object is to analyze how it is advertised in the museum catalogue. Was the object featured as one of the most prominent examples of African sculpture, or was its artist featured in a similar fashion? For example, in the Sainsbury African Galleries, the description reads: “The galleries also feature important works by some of Africa’s foremost contemporary artists”. Conversely, Western works of art are mostly valued for being made by an individual artist, and are not usually referred to as “some”. However, non-Western objects do not enjoy the same position as the their Western counterparts. They are often deemed valuable for being a great achievement of/from a region. Implicitly, even when the non-Western objects are exhibited as art, their correspondence to Western perceptions of ‘primitive’ art designate their value.
Categorization of an object that has functions in addition to distinct visual elements as art in a museum is a form of appropriation, whereby the object is assigned a new meaning. Most of the objects that are displayed as ‘primitive’ do not fit the category of art in Western terms, which as a category refers to framed paintings that were made with the intention of collection and displayed on a wall to be gazed at (Errington, 206). Since most of the non-Western objects, and specifically ‘primitive’ objects, were not made to be collected, sold and displayed separately on a philint with a glass lid, the display of these objects in a museum is an imposition of Western ideals of art. For instance, as a part of the African collection in the British museum, a group of objects with religious significance are labeled as “Objects of Power” and displayed. When these objects that are used in religious/cultural ceremonies are taken from their contexts and put in museum what power do they have? These objects derive their value from their ceremonial context and usage, once they are stripped of their contexts they lose their aura. (Catalani, 70) Even though in the art galleries the objects are spaced out, the multitude of the objects in the gallery renders a sacred object one among many and a once-sacred object’s value is not differentiated. The objects simply function as three dimensional visuals that help the visitor digest the information on the labels.
Ultimately, the exhibition of non-Western objects that are not intended for aesthetic purposes is problematic because it strips the object from its original context and appropriates it according to the visual and intellectual interests of the curator and the audience. By obscuring the systems of ideas and values behind the object, the presentation of the object as an artwork serves to perpetuate the historical stereotypes and typologies that is included in the cultural baggage of the audience. Furthermore, through classification and categorization the exhibition creates a pseudo-genealogy for the object, distorts its function and reassigns a cultural value to it. It is not only about appreciating an object for its “visual distinction” (Alpers), but also for its representational value. “Curiosity,” which lies in the origin of Western museum practices, is an embodiment of the visually interesting. In the Enlightenment era, an object was deemed worth collecting and displaying if it was possible to derive and produce knowledge from it. These two concepts of visual interest and the desire for rational knowledge remain the pillars of museum experience, and more specifically the museum ritual, which fills the audience with a sense of spiritual pleasure that is related to the satisfaction of the eye and the mind. However, the problem of appropriation for enjoyment still remains. How acceptable is it to appropriate an object made for a religious ritual for the sake and pleasure of the Western museum-goer?
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BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Alpers, Svetlana (1991) ‘The museum as a way of seeing’, in Ivan, Karp and Steven Lavine (eds.) Exhibiting cultures: the poetics and politics of museum. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institute, pp 25–32.
Bennett, Tony (1995) The birth of the museum: history, theory, politics. London: Routledge.
Catalani, Anna. “Displaying Traditional Yorùbá Religious Objects in Museums: The Western Re-Making of a Cultural Heritage.” ResearchGate. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Nov. 2015.
Clifford, James (1988) ‘Histories of the tribal and the modern’ in Clifford, James (1988) The predicament of culture: twentieth century ethnography, literature and art. Cambridge Mass: Harvard University Press, pp 189–214.
Clifford, James (1988) ‘On collecting art and culture’ in Clifford, James (1988) The predicament of culture: twentieth century ethnography, literature and art. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, pp 215–251
Errington, Shelly (1998) The Death of Authentic Primitive Art: and other Tales of Progress. Berkeley: University of California Press.
