Construction will be conducted throughout the summer months with a New curated installation unveiled this September featuring more than 200 objects
Dallas, TX –June 9, 2015 – This month the Dallas Museum of Art began construction on the first redesign of the Museum’s Arts of Africa Gallery in nearly twenty years. The galleries will remain closed throughout the summer, with the unveiling of the redesigned gallery and a new installation opening in September 2015, featuring more than 200 works from the Museum’s acclaimed African art collection.
Research for the reinstallation project, which was sponsored by the Texas Fund for Curatorial Research and overseen by Roslyn Adele Walker, Ph.D., Senior Curator of the Arts of Africa, the Americas, and the Pacific and The Margaret McDermott Curator of African Art, began in 2011 and included visits to national and international museums.
The reconfigured gallery will enable the Museum to display a larger number of works from the collection, including well-known works such as Olowe of Ise’s Kneeling Female Figure with Bowl, alongside recent acquisitions and works that have previously never been on view, including a State Sword by the Asante people of Ghana; a large-scale Yoruba arugba Shango, a caryatid figure holding a container for Shango ritual objects, from Nigeria; and a pair of Fulani six-inch hammered gold earrings. The DMA was an early advocate for the inclusion of African art in American art museums, and the Museum’s dedication to the field has set precedents since the 1950s. The collection is particularly strong in art from the Kongo and Luba cultures in Central Africa and the Yoruba and Edo (Benin kingdom) in West Africa.
In 2009 the Dallas Museum of Art published The Arts of Africa, its first catalogue of African art, in celebration of the 40th anniversary of its acclaimed collection of nearly 2,000 objects. The richly illustrated 320-page book was written by Dr. Walker.
About the Dallas Museum of Art
Established in 1903, the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) is among the 10 largest art museums in the country and is distinguished by its commitment to research, innovation, and public engagement. At the heart of the Museum and its programs is its global collection, which encompasses more than 23,000 works and spans 5,000 years of history, representing a full range of world cultures. Located in the nation’s largest arts district, the Museum acts as a catalyst for community creativity, engaging people of all ages and backgrounds with a diverse spectrum of programming, from exhibitions and lectures to concerts, literary events, and dramatic and dance presentations. Since the Museum’s return to free general admission in 2013, the DMA has welcomed more than two million visitors, and enrolled more than 100,000 people in DMA Friends, the nation’s first free museum membership program. For more information, visit DMA.org.
The Dallas Museum of Art is supported, in part, by the generosity of DMA Partners and donors, the citizens of Dallas through the City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs, and the Texas Commission on the Arts.
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