Nmuo Spirits Live Again at Gibson Gallery with Masks of Nigeria
SUNY Potsdam's Art Museum Celebrates Heritage of Igbo-African People
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POTSDAM, NY (01/27/2011)(readMedia)-- The Roland Gibson Gallery will celebrate Black History Month with a special exhibition celebrating the artistic heritage of the Igbo-African people of Oba-Idemili, Nigeria.
"Nmuo Spirits" will highlight the use of masks as both ritualistic and communication figures among the Nigerian Igbo people, with a selection of spirit masks, costumes, divination objects, Ikenga figures and Igbo shrine panels.
There will be an opening reception from 5 to 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 3, at the art museum located on the SUNY Potsdam campus. The exhibit will run from Jan. 31 to Feb. 26.
The show will focus on Igbo masks as a composite artform that communicates ideas through interpersonal and intrinsic symbols and through ritualized action-based societal conventions. The "Nmuo Spirits" exhibit will also shed light on the masks' role in ritual, entertainment, politics and gender issues.
This exhibit will give visitors an on-the-spot explanation, so they can witness a mask figure in motion, observe its performance, and appreciate the fundamentals of its design. This experience will enable visitors to go beyond museum exhibition discussion to a practical arena, where they can feel the complex dynamics of communication beneath a mask.
"By gaining appreciation for these masks, visitors will come away with enriched multicultural ties and interpersonal literacy," said gallery Director April Vasher-Dean.
The aim of the "Nmuo Spirits" exhibit is to enable visitors to appreciate the African mask as a central voice that includes the artifact and its techniques, as well as audience and social conventions in a communication system significant in Africa. The show will incorporate an interdisciplinary and cross-cultural approach to show the place of music, dance, ritual and oral saga in the masking experience of various cultural groups.
The exhibition is supported by the SUNY Potsdam Student Government Association, the Potsdam College Foundation and the Sweetgrass Foundation.
The Gibson Gallery is the art museum at SUNY Potsdam and serves as the center for visual arts at the College through the collection, exhibition and interpretation of quality works of art. The museum's collection includes significant works from the 20th and 21st centuries as well as earlier pieces. The Gibson Gallery's mission is to make direct experience of the visual arts accessible to students, faculty, staff and alumni, as well as to residents of Northern New York.
Admission to the Gibson Gallery, located at Brainerd Hall, is free and the art museum is open to the public from noon until 5 p.m. on Monday - Friday, from noon until 5 p.m. and from noon until 4 p.m. on Saturdays.
For more information, call (315) 267-3290 or visit www.potsdam.edu/gibson.
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Founded in 1816, and located on the outskirts of the beautiful Adirondack Park, the State University of New York at Potsdam is one of America's first 50 colleges. SUNY Potsdam currently enrolls approximately 4,350 undergraduate and graduate students. Home to the world-renowned Crane School of Music, SUNY Potsdam is known for its handcrafted education, challenging liberal arts and sciences core, excellence in teacher training and leadership in the performing and visual arts.
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