Peace, Power & Prestige: Metal Arts in Africa

The exhibition Peace, Power & Prestige: Metal Arts in Africa explores the roles of metal objects in sustaining, unifying, and enhancing life in African communities while demonstrating the aesthetic and expressive power of metal arts. For millennia, African metalsmiths have drawn upon the inherent power and beauty of metal to create dazzling and enduring objects, including body adornment and currency items, for proclaiming wealth and social status; staffs, scepters, weaponry, and other regalia as emblems of leadership and authority; and amulets and sacred objects used in spiritual mediation and healing. The exhibition of over 140 pieces includes a diverse range of iron, brass, bronze, gold, copper, silver, and alloyed works created by artists in Sub-Saharan Africa between the twelfth and twenty-first centuries. The selected objects are from the collection of the Harn Museum of Art at the University of Florida and from private collections, most notably that of Drs. John and Nicole Dintenfass.