African Shona stone sculpture. A long stone with a gouged furrow into which is nested mixed metal visage of a face peeking through the opening. Signed by artist on base, MAK.

Size: 6 x 16 1/2 x 2 1/2 in.

#2394 . 

The art of stone carving in Africa goes back many centuries, with the akwanshi (“stone of dead ancestors” in the Ekoi language) monoliths from the Cross River region in Nigeria dating back possibly as early as 300 B.C. African cultures venerated organic materials, and carved deities, animals, and their fellow tribesmen out of wood, stone, shell, and more. In 1957 Frank McEwen was appointed as the first curator of the new National Gallery in Salisbury, Rhodesia (now Harare, Zimbabwe). He had previously been curator at the Musee Rodin in Paris and had links with various artists of the time, including Picasso (himself heavily influenced by African art) and Matisse. McEwen was impressed with the talent of the indigenous artists he met in Zimbabwe, and encouraged them to paint and later to sculpt. Because of his contacts in the international art world, he was able to give the movement that later became known as “Shona sculpture” (after Zimbabwe’s most numerous tribe) its first international exposure. This abstract representation of a face pays homage to those ancient monoliths first discovered by Europeans in the early 1900s, as well as the Shona culture of the 900s that flourished throughout Central and Southern Africa.