National Museum of African Art facts for kids
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| Former name | Museum of African Art |
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| Established | 1964 |
| Location | Washington, D.C., United States |
| Collections | African art |
| Collection size | 11,800 |
| Visitors | 213,000 (2016) |
| Founder | Warren M. Robbins |
| Public transit access |     at Smithsonian |
The National Museum of African Art is a special museum in Washington, D.C. It is part of the famous Smithsonian Institution. This museum is all about African art. It is located on the National Mall in the capital city of the United States.
The museum has a huge collection. It includes over 9,000 artworks from both southern and northern Africa. These artworks are both old and new. The museum also has 300,000 photographs and 50,000 books. It was the first museum in the United States to focus only on African art. Today, it still has the largest collection of its kind. Many people see it as a very important place for African art around the world.
A former U.S. diplomat named Warren M. Robbins started the museum in 1964. It began in Capitol Hill. At first, it focused on traditional African art. Its goal was to teach people about black cultural heritage. To make sure the museum would last, Robbins asked the U.S. Congress to make it part of the Smithsonian. It joined the Smithsonian in 1979. Two years later, it became the National Museum of African Art. A new building for the museum was finished in 1987. Most of this building is underground. It is located near other Smithsonian museums. It is one of the Smithsonian's smaller museums.
Over the next 20 years, the museum became more focused on serious study. It collected important traditional and modern artworks. The museum shows both its own art and art borrowed from other places. It often features single artists or big shows about many different art styles. The museum usually has two or three temporary exhibits each year. It also hosts about ten special events. The short way to say its name is NMAfA.
Contents
History of the Museum
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In the late 1950s, an American diplomat named Warren M. Robbins bought 32 pieces of African art. He found them in an antique shop in Germany. In 1963, he started a group called the Center for Cross Cultural Communication. This group aimed to teach people and share cultures.
In 1964, a historic house on Capitol Hill became available. It was the former home of Frederick Douglass. Robbins used all his savings to buy half of the house. He took out a loan for the rest. With money raised by his group, Robbins was able to open the Museum of African Art.
The museum officially opened in 1964. Its first show included Robbins's collection and two other artworks. At first, the museum focused on traditional African art. It also had a big goal to teach people about black cultural heritage. It was a friendly place for people interested in American racial politics. This fit with the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. This movement wanted to change how Americans saw African cultures. Robbins used to say his museum was "an education department with a museum attached". By 1976, the museum had 20 staff members and 6,000 art objects. Robbins also visited Africa for the first time that year.
To make sure the museum would continue, Robbins asked the U.S. Congress to make it part of the Smithsonian Institution. The Smithsonian is a group of museums and research centers run by the government. The House of Representatives agreed to this plan in 1978. Many important leaders supported it. The Smithsonian officially took over the museum the next year. They started planning to move the art from the old townhouses to a proper museum building. In 1981, the museum was renamed the National Museum of African Art.
In 1983, Sylvia Williams became the museum's new director. Later that year, the Smithsonian started building a new home for the museum. It was located on the National Mall. The new building was mostly underground. It gave the museum much more space for exhibits. It opened in September 1987. Over time, people started to look at African art differently. They began to study old objects for their beauty and how they were made. Williams, as director, focused on a scholarly approach. She looked for valuable art pieces. The collection grew to include modern works and art from Arab North Africa. Before, it had mainly focused on art from Sub-Saharan Africa. The museum's founder, Warren Robbins, did not like this new direction. He felt the museum was forgetting its public role.
After Williams passed away in 1996, Roslyn Walker became director in 1997. She retired in 2002. Walker continued the museum's new direction. She added a special gallery and a curator for modern art. She also created an office to raise money. This money helped renovate the museum's building in the early 2000s.
Sharon Patton became director in 2003 and left in 2008. During her time, the museum had more shows for children. Johnnetta Cole, a scholar and former college president, became director in 2009. She retired in 2017. Gus Casely-Hayford took over in 2018.
In 2021, Ngaire Blankenberg became director. In 2022, the museum returned 29 Benin Bronzes to Nigeria. These artworks had been taken a long time ago. Blankenberg left her role in March 2023.
The museum was planned for a big renovation starting in 2014. This was part of a larger Smithsonian project. However, these plans were later changed and scaled back.
Museum Operations
In the late 2000s, the museum faced some challenges. It had fewer visitors, a smaller budget, and its location was a bit hidden. It also had changes in leadership. Even 30 years after joining the Smithsonian, it remains one of the smallest museums in the group. In 2016, it had about 213,000 visitors. This is much less than the millions of visitors the Smithsonian gets each year. One reason for fewer visitors is its location. The original Smithsonian Institution Building, called the Castle, hides it from the main National Mall.
The museum's budget has changed over the years. In 2016, it was about $5 million. The museum also had fewer staff members. Like many other museums, it has been looking for private donations to help. In late 2016, the museum held its first big fundraising dinner.
Museum Building and Design
Building the museum's National Mall location started in 1983. This project also included the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery for Asian art. Together, they created a huge 368,000 square feet of exhibit space. The total cost was $73.2 million. Half of this money came from the government. Most of this space was built underground. This was done so it would not block the view of the historic Smithsonian Castle or its gardens. The Castle hides the museum from the National Mall. This has led to fewer visitors compared to other attractions on the Mall.
The African art museum and the Sackler Gallery were built as twin buildings. Each has one floor above ground. They have similar exhibit spaces, with five galleries each. Only one gallery has natural light. You can tell them apart by their roofs. The African art building has domes, while the Sackler has pyramids.
The African art building is made of red granite. It uses the circle shape in its design. It has round windows, a round entrance, and six round domes on its roof. Inside, a bright stone entrance area looks out over the gardens. A curving staircase leads visitors down to the galleries. The galleries are large. Designers can change them into smaller rooms to fit different art objects. The buildings can be seen from Independence Avenue. The new Enid A. Haupt Garden runs between them and the Smithsonian Castle.
Underground, the museum and its offices take up two levels. A third level has rooms for exhibits and education. These levels are connected by a three-story enclosed walkway. This walkway has large skylights that let light in from the gardens above. The museum's above-ground part was updated in the early 2000s. A company called Eastman Kodak gave a large donation for this.
A sculpture by Yinka Shonibare called Wind Sculpture VII was placed outside the museum in late 2016. It is now a permanent display.
Art Collections
The National Museum of African Art was the first museum in the U.S. to focus on African art. The Center for African Art in New York opened later, in 1984. The National Museum has a much larger collection. As of 2008, it had 9,000 art objects and 300,000 photographs. The art objects include sculptures and masks from the 1400s. They also have modern multimedia art. The photographs include important works from photojournalists Eliot Elisofon and Constance Stuart Larrabee. Elisofon covered big events for Life magazine. Larrabee photographed World War II and life in South Africa. In 2004, the museum had 400 modern artworks.
The museum collects items for both their traditional uses and their beauty. It receives about 67 gifts of art each year. Because of its wide range of collections and special shows, the museum is seen as a "solid force in the international art world". It is also the main place for modern African art in the United States.
When the museum moved to the National Mall in the mid-1980s, its collection had over 6,000 art objects. These included sculptures, artifacts, and textiles. It also had the large Elisofon photography collection. This original collection focused on Sub-Saharan Africa. It had more art from the Guinea coast and Western Sudan than from Central Africa. The museum's first budget for buying art came when it joined the Smithsonian.
Within ten years, the collection grew to 7,000 traditional and modern objects from all over Africa. Under director Roslyn Walker, the museum added more modern art. It opened a permanent gallery for it in 1997. That year, photographer Constance Stuart Larrabee gave the museum 3,000 photos from South Africa. In 2005, the museum received the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection. This collection had 525 artworks from many different African art styles and cultures. This was a big deal for the museum.
The museum's library also grew after joining the Smithsonian. It went from 3,000 to 30,000 books. These books cover visual arts, history, religion, and travel, especially books published in Africa. Now, it has 50,000 books.
In March 2022, the museum announced it would return 39 Benin Bronzes to Nigeria. These artworks were taken during the Benin Expedition of 1897 long ago. These pieces will be shown at the National Museum of Benin in Benin City.
Exhibitions and Shows
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The museum held 130 special shows in its first 25 years. Since joining the Smithsonian, it hosts two to three temporary exhibitions each year. Before joining the Smithsonian, the museum often borrowed art for its shows. In the early 1980s, its curators created "focus" shows. These shows centered around one single art object from the collection. The museum also hosted guest curators and traveling exhibits. Its shows became more impressive as its connections and budget grew.
When the National Mall building opened, the museum showed 375 artworks. These were in five small and medium-sized exhibits. Some shows gave a general overview, while others focused on one theme. The main exhibit was "African Art in the Cycle of Life". It showed 88 items in seven sections. These sections followed seven stages of African tribal life. This helped explain how the art was used in society. For example, one section showed figures of mothers. Another showed masks used in coming-of-age ceremonies. Many of these artworks were masterpieces borrowed from other museums and private collections. Another exhibit showed 100 items from the museum's own collection. The other three exhibits were smaller. They featured West African textiles, Benin sculptures, and useful objects like baskets. The exhibits were chosen to challenge old ideas about African art. They wanted to show new ways of looking at it.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the museum had shows on Egyptian modern art and textiles from Madagascar. A gift from photographer Constance Stuart Larrabee in 1997 led to a special exhibit. In 1998, the museum held a show about Yoruba sculptor Olowe of Ise. This was rare because it focused on a single African artist. The book that came with the exhibit was the first scholarly book about a traditional African artist. The museum has also had solo shows for artists like Sokari Douglas Camp (1989) and Yinka Shonibare (2010).
Shows for children, like "Playful Performers", were popular in the mid-2000s. Shows featuring "Treasures" from the museum's collection also drew crowds. A 2004 show called "Insights" highlighted 30 artworks about Apartheid in South Africa. In 2013, the museum received its largest gift ever, $1.8 million from Oman. This money was for a series of shows focusing on arts from Oman and its connections to cultures in the Near East.
A 2015 exhibit called "Conversations: African and African-American Artworks in Dialogue" caused some discussion. It featured artworks from the private collection of Bill and Camille Cosby. Camille Cosby was on the museum's advisory board. The exhibit was funded by a $716,000 donation from the Cosbys. It was planned to bring attention to the museum for its 50th anniversary. Some critics felt the museum should not have shown a private collection that was not promised to the museum. They thought it hurt the museum's reputation.
Educational Programs
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The museum focused a lot on education in its early years. Its founder called it "an education department with a museum attached". The museum had a friendly atmosphere. It offered many programs to teach about black cultural heritage. Many children from local schools visited the museum. They had exhibits that helped them learn "how to look at art". This included comparing traditional African art with modern art. Through the 1990s, school groups took guided tours with trained docents. When the museum moved to the National Mall, more people visited without a guide.
In the early 1980s, the Smithsonian noticed that few of its visitors were from minority groups. This was true even though Washington, D.C., had a large black population. So, they created a group to fix this. The African art museum, before moving to the National Mall, served a diverse neighborhood. It had diverse staff and programs that were popular with local schools. These programs included films, folk stories, and talks. The museum also offered workshops on African stripweave (a type of weaving) and talking drums.
The museum director in the mid-2000s said that many people in Washington did not know about the museum. She said that only half of taxi drivers knew where it was. During her time, the museum had more shows for children. Because of this, for a short time, more children visited than adults. Around this time, the museum held about ten special events each year. In 2016, the museum was still working hard to attract visitors and donations.
Images for kids
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The National Museum of African Art building.
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Warren M. Robbins, the museum's founder.
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Sylvia Williams, a former director.
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Johnnetta Cole, another former director.
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The museum's first home on Capitol Hill.
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A view of the Smithsonian's quadrangle, where the museum is located.
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A specialist setting up an exhibit.
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An example of a mask on display.
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Another mask from the collection.
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An Edo figure from the museum.
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An ancient ceramic figure.
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A museum guide teaching young children.
See also
In Spanish: Museo Nacional de Arte Africano para niños
