As is often the case in art museums, the Art Institute’s wide-ranging collections are displayed in galleries according to chronology, geography, and media. While this organization helps visitors navigate the movements and moments of global art history, it makes less apparent some of the overlapping and interconnected stories of objects in different areas of the museum.
Zulu artist Mncane Nzuza’s Container for Serving Beer (Ukhamba) (1990s-early 2000s), Emanoel Araujo’s Oxalá (2007), and Richard Hunt’s Cottonwood Hybrid (1956)
Barbara Chase-Riboud’s Zanzibar / Gold #2 (1977), Alberto Giacometti’s Couple (1926), Annie Albers’s Black-White-Red (designed 1926/27, woven 1965), and a Nupe vessel from Nigeria (early 20th century)
In her own work, Leigh draws from a broad array of African and African diasporic traditions. For this installation—which borrows its title from cultural historian Saidiya Hartman—Leigh collaborated with museum curators and posed questions about the ways in which African objects are valued and understood today: Who determines the significance of historical and cultural objects? What deserves to be presented?
Simone Leigh’s Martinique (2024) anchors a space that includes Richard Hunt’s Cottonwood Hybrid (1956), on the left, and a Baga snake headdress from Guinea, on the right.
Artworks such as Oromo pilgrim staffs, Asante gold weights, Yoruba twin figures, and a Nupe vessel are presented alongside 19th- and 20th-century paintings, sculptures, and videos by artists including Constantin Brancusi, Aaron Douglas, Eva Hesse, Ana Mendieta, Steve McQueen, Malangatana Valente Ngwenya, Pablo Picasso, and Betye Saar.
David Hammons’s American Costume (1970), Constantin Brancusi’s Two Penguins (1911–14), and Malangatana’s Final Judgment (Juízo final) (1961)
These juxtapositions prompt visual relationships that may reflect—or obscure—the African continent’s aesthetic influence throughout the world. We invite visitors to explore their own curiosities and stage their own encounters with the artworks on view.
Critical Fabulation is curated by artist Simone Leigh in collaboration with Paulina Pobocha, chair and curator of Modern and Contemporary Art.
