Dear $email,
I really enjoyed this 50 minutes long movie filmed in Cameroon and on the Sablon in Brussels.
“Je ne suis pas moi-même” is a documentary that explains the contradictions in the African antiques world, especially how the African think on there own art, make new objects to look old and that are made to “fool” the unknowing clients . Interesting to see them make a new piece to look old, while they tell you they don’t need a CT scan to feel how old it is !. Having never been there I found it very interesting.
NOTE: Don’t click the image to see the movie visit Je ne suis pas moi-même
It is interesting to see how the masks are made “old” and how the tourist in Africa tries to convince to do an exchange with some “white gold” (sic) . It is interesting to see how the “runners” operate in Africa to buy so-called “antique” objects, and why “stolen object” are just sold instead of stolen, how a replacement object is made to be able to buy a badly carved “tabouret” from the Queen mother of Kom. How dealing happens in Foumbam or Douala . In Bamenda the journalist made the cultural minister very nervous asking him questions about the “trafficking” of antiquities, and the laws that should make illicit any export of art outside Cameroon . When the African “African art” dealers speak together, it is to explain how to make the “patina” more convincing. What declaration is given when the objects get out of the country in Douala, is what matters, since as a dealer told, nobody seems to have the expertise in Africa. The movie also show some images taken during the Bruneaf , how X-Rays can help to see if an object has been restored. In the RMCA Museum of Tervueren, the conservator explains the “religious spirit” is not in Africa anymore, but this wasn’t a convincing argument to me when watching the vivid dancing in the beginning of the movie.. In the five last minutes of the movie you see a collector hesitating to buy a Yombe mask for 2,500 €. The chances are high that mask was made less than five years ago. Humidity in Congo is high and objects often don’t survive if not kept in good conditions. If it is a genuine Yombe mask it is worth hundred of thousands euros, but in this business, it is the authenticating of the objects that is the most important skill. Never forget that it is already more than 120 years that the objects from Africa are collected in the Western countries.
A related book:
The Savage Hits Back by Julius E. Lips, Br…Visiting Professor of Anthropology at Columbia University
formerly Head of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Cologne and Director of the
Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum .WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY BRONISLAW MALINOWSKI. Translated from the German
NEW HAVEN YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 1937
It is all about the way traditional artists viewed the first missionaries,soldiers,explorers and traders [ The Savage Hits Back is full of examples]
Read also my posting from yesterday:http://africanartclub.com/african-art/announcements/stop-4-days-before-2012-good-news-and-bad-news/
I wish also to congratulate all the new members of the African Art Club. On Tuesday 1 January the African Art Club membership will be 20 % more expensive. More info …
Hope you enjoyed this edition.
David Norden
P.S.: Your comments on the movie are welcome at http://africanartclub.com/african-art/je-ne-suis-pas-moi-meme/ ?
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David, have you ever seen the video “In And Out Of Africa” which documents the life of a runner named Gbaare who brings merchandise in and out of New York and Brussels from Mali? It was made a number of years ago and distributed in VHS format. It was made by Christopher Steiner and featured Tim Hammill and Bernard deGrunne among others. It showed how pieces were faked to look old and it was similar to the one you described.
Gary
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Thank you David for this infos, i have been all over Africa since 1964 and collected African art since 1958, and only after 1973 i notice a big change in collecting.
today in africa they are robe of their mineral, and they see theses auction catalogue and price and they want to cashing, i do not blame them, who i blame is the so call expert who help the lies to expand, i was expose to incredible lies from the top dealers not yesterday but 45 years ago. Helena Rubinstein show me one of the biggest dealer in Paris,
after she purchase from the dealer one year later she want to change for another piece that dealer had the goal to say to her ,it was not from him even with his receipt,today many provenance are made up by dealer from an exposition of a piece put in a book and become priceless, Andre Malraux who save l’art primitif in France never like the merchant
he always call them ,des marchand de brousailles,many artists who love african art was because it was affordable ,Pablo one day with Cocteau tol me how and why he appreciate African art, and it was nothing to do with all expert saying it was spiritual,and very view talk about this incredible value of the meaning of each piece.SAD. François L.
Francois, I think the expertise today among dealers is higher than 50-60 years ago, but it still can be tricky to collect.
Its good to know all these… Thanks Norden
Hi David, his is really an interesting piece… Thanks for this video….
Else Kirsten Ulla on facebook 9:08pm Dec 30
Dear David,
about the film….nobody wants to know…..nobody wants to show….in the hands of an African it’s worth almost nothing….in a fancy gallery, well that’s something else….is this the same as whitewashing of money, but instead of money….art ???? My suspicion about how it works was confirmed with this film…and something else…..none of my pieces smell of smoke….they smell like old wood
Else
Dear Else,
I do not agree hundred procent, when a piece is old the African can also sell it for much money. This movie shows me African dealers having most of the time some more recently carved objects. Of course the person who sells is also important, because he is known for his “integrity” and becomes a “provenance”. What you see in the movie, is that the black people find all the objects they have “treasures”, they don’t tell you the real story. And Else, between us, old wood doesn’t smell at all.
There is nothing wrong with the Africans carving art objects and trying to sell them to Westerners. This is a legit business and the prices should be negotiated between seller and buyer, and the African seller can smoke the piece and add to its patina to make it more attractive to the buyer. The criminals are the Western dealers that fake provenance. The African seller says the piece is antique, and you can believe or disbelieve. When a dealer fakes provenance he is responsible for a criminal act that should result in him losing his job and being ostracized by the community of dealers and collectors. It would be good to have a list in the public domain of the cheaters among the dealers that have the guts to fake provenance and thus increase ten-fold or hundred-fold the value of their newly made piece. Many of us collectors know very well who is involved in such criminal acts, but the information is only transferred by word of mouth. Who has the guts to publish a list?
Thank you very much for this link, i’ve been in africa many times and i’ve seen a lot of runners and dealers and fake objects.
But i must say that i’ve seen strange objects even in some european
Galleries. Never trust anyone. The only way is to know very well what you are going to buy.
caveat emptor Let the buyer beware.
To stay in business, one must buy low and sell high. People who buy art must have disposible income, ie. more than they need to live. People who love are but do not have disposible income should go to museums. African art is a world where there are no standard brands like Mercedes and Audi. You can never be certain of what you are buying.
OK. Let us be wary. Expertise for profit of all kinds needs to cost a lot – to pay the rent and pay for the time preparing and waiting. Each time that desirable things are voluntarily exchanged the prices increase enormously.
We should note how an African Art dealer can become expert. I have studied everything available to him, for fun without a need to sell anything. Like him, I am only able to be very modestly an expert.
I read the books. The words are irrelevant to judging “authenticity”. I look at thousands of objects in books, museums, galleries, and flea markets. It is simply not possible to certify “authenticity”.
I enjoy buying pieces from flea markets in Paris and the States for around $200 which would cost thousands from a dealer. I would not want to buy pieces obtained by colonials.
The best evidence of authenticity of the pieces I buy is that it would not pay for the unknown source to fake the damage. Like someone wanting to sell, I enjoy “restoring”.
Suppose American collectors had an interest in European tombstones or representations of Mary or Santa. Would it pay for Europeans to fake them?
Fascinating topic for a discussion. I began collecting small pieces of ‘art’ from Africa recently after living in Brussels and visiting the Marolles market. I have no illusions about provenance whatever the charming ‘runners’ tell me. The expensive galleries in Sablon are the real frauds, not the market pieces which are priced as copies – assuming you bargain hard with the sellers! But the galleries sell items at huge amounts of euros that are clearly not old and can be bought by the shrewd market frequenter for a fraction of their gallery price. There is a saying here in England: ‘a fool and his money are easily parted’. So buyer beware indeed! Shed all illusions about this business, shop shrewdly and don’t pay big bucks and you can and will find affordable artifacts. Not ancient stuff, but most of it is not all that old even in the big galleries. Open your eyes and don’t be taken in by dealers who are there to make a financial killing from the unsuspecting, the gullible and those with more money than sense. Mike
This is indeed a fascinating topic for discussion. And virtually all of the writings, except here, are written by people with some interest in African art selling high.
Every buyer, high and low, has stories and viewpoints. I wish many buyers, as well as sellers, would share them.
I’ll tell a bit about copying. Copying is standard village practice regardless of the collector market. Very few pieces are not copies, and these are less desired. Availability to collectors depends on village users being glad to replace old worn pieces.
A year ago a Fang statuette sold for a million euros or so. I noticed that it was identical to an illustrated one of a major curator. It made her extremely happy to learn that either hers or the million dollar one is an exact copy.
I very much enjoyed reading the comments above by ‘Jack’ .He writes with honesty and real insight into this business, and it is business regardless of how much aesthetic enjoyment I get from these little treasures I have found on my travels round the street market in Brussels. I too read books and visit museums like the ones in Paris and Tervuren in Brussels. I have no problem with the street sellers, they have a living to make, kids to feed and I have learned to bargain, but not to insult them with a rock bottom price! But I find it difficult to hide my annoyance with the gallery owners in the posh shops who are selling the same sort of stock as the market traders, but at astronomical prices. Do they really expect to get that sort of mega-money? And do people really pay those prices? I guess for some buyers money is no object. But they use their posh shops to inflate prices for pure profit, living on the backs of the couriers who do the hard work getting the stuff to Europe and living quite hard lives while they are here trying to sell their stock. I have talked to some of these guys and they have a story to tell that is well worth listening too. They know what the Sablon sealers charge for pieces they have sold them for a few euros, and they have no option but to sell for turnover is the name of the game. They cannot afford to have principles because they have kids to feed back in Congo or wherever. I wish them well and there is surely an anthropology thesis there waiting for its doctoral candidate to write it up! I am as interested in the story of the trade and the runners asI am in the art itself. It is a fascinating world and When I look at my modest pieces on my shelves I also think of how they got here from their origins. Mike
There is only one book I know about the business in Africa (Cameroon). Sorry, my references are back in Toronto.
Today I cruised the galleries in the St. Germaine des Pres neighborhood in Paris. I found several of my various African vendor friends also cruising Rue des Beaux Art. They gave me big hugs after not seeing me for a year, and of course began the selling. One persuaded me to follow him to a car several blocks away where the bargaining got pretty hard. I bought a unique beautifully old painted light wood Ibo mask for 50 euros and a 9 inch new looking polished Yombe maternity figure with flat glass eyes for 100 euros.
I visited my white friend Mark Gam at the Mark Gam Gallery on Rue Bonaparte whom I recommend as down-to-earth obsessed. He always has friends hanging around for a beer or coffee.
I liked visiting the Ratton-Hourde gallery on the corner which always has just a small number of especially beautiful showings which I have rarely dared to price. Hourde himself is a great abstract artist.
I find gallery owners to be very nice people who love the stuff more than the runners on the streets. They do the best they can for the business, selecting the best they can for people who can afford it. Of course there is a mark up, but I think there are people with money who don’t want to be hugged by African vendors on the street for a hard sell. Also if you buy from a gallery you get a reciept which I suppose helps ensure that you or your kids can resell.
I think these galleries take stuff on consignment from the African runners.
Last Saturday at the Port de Vanves antique-junk street market I got hugged, and I handed over 50 euros to Mohammed. He showed me pieces he would sell me for that. I picked a nine inch guy in a basket of feathers and twigs.
Last Monday at the Clignencourt flea market I got a great hug (after a year away), and I select for 150 euros a Baga man with prominant paunch and penis. Trouble is getting back to my pad I found it is too tall for my max size suitcase. Carried separately the airline might charge me $200 for it. I think I’ll temporarily saw off the legs. I prefer buying on my side of the pond because of the airlines. What a hassle it must be to bring the stuff from Africa. Maybe it’s made in Paris and Washington.
I worked for a school year in Brussels before the euro. I keep meaning to get up there again to meet kindly David.
Jack paints a delightful picture here of a day out looking for affordable treasures, almost poetic! Well I don’t get hugs from the African runners and I am used to their insistent selling style. But who can blame them for trying, there are not many of these guys with big assets stored away in a Swiss bank! There my well be nice people too running the posh galleries, I was not intending to give the impression of hard faced crooks, far from it. But they hold the upper hand economically with the runners and they certainly make it count.
One runner who I have got to know in Brussels tells me that these galery people drive a very hard bargain because they know the runners just have to sell to make ends meet and to cover their costs. The same guy tells me that as soon as the goods he sells for a song get into the smart galleries the price is multiplied many many times….often accompanied by an invented provenance that no one in this business has any way of testing.
My instincts are to identify with the little people at the bottom of this ‘food chain’. I love the art but art is always connected to a broader cultural context and that aspect appeals to me too, fellows humans struggling just to make a living, and often against the odds. There is always a fascinating social narrative surrounding the production of art and always has been. I can never wander round the Marolles district without recalling that in the days of the Northern Renaissance these means streets housed over 3000 artists making everything from tapestries to polychrome carved figures, and much more. And I recall the image in one book of the wonderful Bruegel the elder rushing down the street from his studio towards that church just below Sablon, struggling into his best doublet because late for his own wedding because he had got too absorbed in one of his masterpieces.
Art is life, but it is certainly not more important than those who both make the art and those who make it available to the market. But there are some members of the art market who deserve our sympathy rather more than others!
Glad you found nice things to take back home from your Paris wanderings Jack. If you can find those references maybe you email them to my ‘business’ address at: michael.oneill AT ntu.ac.uk.
Meanwhile, safe return to wherever, and hopefully without having to muilate your figurine!!!