Smithsonian Libraries African Art Index Project DSI Search this
Type:
Articles
Date:
2003
Notes:
Color illustrations.
Stephen Mellor, chief conservator for the National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, presented this paper at an American Institute for Conservation (AIC) conference. The paper, which was published in the Journal of the AIC (volume unspecified), examines the use, function and maintenance of particular objects with nontangible significance in some African cultures. Mellor concludes it is not necessary for conservators to treat African objects that are out of their cultural context with the same strict behavior required when they are within their cultural context. Nevertheless, he believes that the acknowledgment and understanding of the nontangible attributes of African objects should affect the way conservators think about African art, and that conservation and exhibition decisions should be overshadowed by the responsibility to treat or participate in the installation of African objects in a manner that conscientiously respects the dignity of the cultures that produced them. - - after original abstract.
Topic:
Art, African--Conservation and restoration--Moral and ethical aspects Search this
