African Art Collection put back on display

When Southern University at New Orleans (SUNO) was inundated by flood waters in 2005, it was more than the walls that were left covered in the grime. The university’s vast collection of African art also found itself submerged beneath the waters brought by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, leaving 573 of the 894 artifacts in need of stabilization and conservation treatment in order to once again be “exhibit ready.”

This week, however, select works from the university’s African Art Collection will be back on display in SUNO’s Leonard S. Washington Memorial Library as part of an exhibit entitle, “Celebrating a Legacy.”

The exhibit is being curated by Museum Studies graduate student Erika N. Witt, who has been working on the exhibit, which is her thesis project, for the past year. “I want people to know about and be proud of this collection,” Witt said.

The exhibit is being sponsored by the MA Museum Studies Program, the Center for African and African American Studies and the Leonard S. Washington Memorial Library, and will feature spirit pieces from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, textiles, drums, slit gongs, weaponry, masks, door posts and pottery representing the African continent. The mediums consist of wood, fibers and metals.

Once she has her graduate degree, she hopes to become a curator, Egyptologist or an African Art historian.

“I want people to be proud of our ancestry,” Witt said. “Let’s celebrate those people who came against their will to build this country. Let’s celebrate SUNO for having this collection. It’s something to celebrate.”

For information, visit SUNO.edu.

This article originally published in the March 2, 2015 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.