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Standing figure

Photo: Paul Macapia

Standing figure

Kongo

Congolese

This man stands in between, he will be called "mendele lombe" in Kongo--"a white/black person." He has given up his state of being fully indigenous, and he can't be fully colonial. They were seen as dogs sleeping with wolves in the forest.

Wood, glass, and surface deposits
7 3/4 x 2 in. (19.7 x 5.1 cm)
Gift of Katherine White and the Boeing Company
81.17.839
Provenance: {Herbert F.} Rieser, London, England; sold to Katherine White (1929-1980), Seattle, Washington, 1969; bequeathed to Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Washington, 1981
Photo: Paul Macapia
location
Now on view at the Seattle Art Museum

Resources

Exhibition HistoryLos Angeles, California, Frederick S. Wight Art Gallery, University of California, African Art in Motion: Icon and Act, Jan. 20 - Mar. 17, 1974 (Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art, May 5 - Sept. 22, 1974). Text by Robert Farris Thompson. No cat. no., pp. 63-64, reproduced pl. 82 (as standing male figure).

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Praise Poems: The Katherine White Collection, July 29 - Sept. 29, 1984 (Washington, D.C., National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Oct. 31, 1984 - Feb. 25, 1985; Raleigh, North Carolina Museum of Art, Apr. 6 - May 19, 1985; Fort Worth, Texas, Kimbell Art Museum, Sept. 7 - Nov. 25, 1985; Kansas City, Missouri, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Mar. 8 - Apr. 20, 1986).

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, The Museum: Mixed Metaphors, Fred Wilson, Jan. 28 - June 13, 1993.

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Art from Africa: Long Steps Never Broke a Back, Feb. 7 - May 19, 2002 (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Oct. 2, 2004 - Jan. 2, 2005; Hartford, Connecticut, Wadsworth Atheneum, Feb. 12 - June 19, 2005; Cincinnati, Ohio, Cincinnati Art Museum, Oct. 8, 2005 - Jan. 1, 2006; Nashville, Tennessee, Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Jan. 27 - Apr. 30, 2006 [as African Art, African Voices: Long Steps Never Broke a Back]). Text by Pamela McClusky. No cat. no., pp. 157, 159, reproduced pl. 79.

Seattle Art Museum respectfully acknowledges that we are on Indigenous land, the traditional territories of the Coast Salish people. We honor our ongoing connection to these communities past, present, and future.

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