February 26, 2007
African art highlighted through lecture and tours on March 29
Gainesville, Fla. – Spend an evening learning about art in Africa and exploring the wealth of African art on display at the Harn Museum of Art. The Harn Museum will remain open until 10 p.m. on March 29 for Museum Nights, during which a lecture and docent-led tour will take place. One of the museum’s six collecting areas, African art plays a prominent role at the Harn and is featured in four of the museum’s current exhibitions: “Continuity and Change: Three Generations of Ethiopian Artists,” “Art of the Ethiopian Highlands from the Harn Museum Collection,” “African Arts of Healing and Divination,” and “Highlights from the African Collection.”
At 7 p.m. Okwui Enwezor, an internationally recognized scholar, will present the keynote address for the Arts Council of the African Studies Association’s 14th Triennial Symposium on African Art. This year’s symposium explores the place of African arts in global contexts; particularly the ways African arts draw from and contribute to global histories, cultures and aesthetics. His lecture is titled “Placemaking or in the ‘Wrong Place:’ Contemporary African Artists and the Global Stage” and will take place in the University Auditorium.
Enwezor was born and raised in Nigeria. He later moved to New York and studied political science at Jersey City State College. From 1998 to 2002 he served as artistic director of “Documenta 11” in Kassel, Germany. He has also been artistic director for the 2nd Johannesburg Biennale in South Africa and has curated exhibitions in New York, Sweden and Mexico City. He has written on contemporary African art as well as American and international art and is the founding publisher and co-editor of “Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art.”
At 7:30 p.m. a trained docent will lead an exhibition spotlight on “Continuity and Change: Three Generations of Ethiopian Artists.” Following dinner at the Camellia Court Café, the docent will take visitors on a tour of the exhibition, providing information about the art and artists. “Continuity and Change” tells the story of modern and contemporary art in Ethiopia from the 1940s to the present and explores the role of government support of the artists as part of a purposeful strategy for modernization. The exhibition also examines the influence of the Addis Ababa Fine Arts School, one of Africa’s leading art academies. Many Ethiopian artists remain largely unknown out of Ethiopia. “Continuity and Change” introduces a number of these artists to U.S. audiences for the first time.
Admission to the Harn Museum of Art is free. For more information about programs and events call 352.392.9826 or visit www.harn.ufl.edu.
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The Harn Museum, at SW 34th St. and Hull Rd., Gainesville, Fla., is one of the southeast’s largest university art museums with more than 6,200 works in its collection and an array of temporary exhibitions. Admission is free. The museum enhances the activities of the University and serves a culturally diverse audience through educational programming. The Harn expanded by more than 18,000 square feet in Oct. 2005 with the opening of the Mary Ann Harn Cofrin Pavilion, which includes new educational and meeting areas and the Camellia Court Cafe, the first eatery for visitors of the University of Florida Cultural Plaza. Museum Hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. The Camellia Court Café is open 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday. The Museum and Café are open until 10 p.m. Thursdays for Museum Nights. For more information call 352.392.9826 or visit www.harn.ufl.edu.