Nothing like the MIngei for a quick art fix on a lazy Sunday
afternoon. Mingei is the name coined for “folk art” – wherein everyday objects
used by ordinary folk is worthy of a place in a museum. A preservation for
posterity of everyday life from the past. I have dragged my daughter along to
her share of museums everywhere from The Getty, The Louvre, Musee De Orsay,
LACMA, the Huntington, and the local museums here and if she has to pick her
favorites, I think she will pick Mingei first and the Orsay as her second.
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| Let a child mess with a pepper tree once so they won't do it again. Messing with the #4 company is like trying to defeat a crocodile |
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| The clever Anasi rules here |
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| Loved this one as it had a woman leading a company! |
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| Trust this company to protect and care for the diverse chicks |
The Mingei, because of its focus on folk art makes it very
approachable to everyone and you don’t need to have a degree in art history or
know your periods or the difference between Monet and Manet, to spend an afternoon gazing there. Also due to their focus
on folk, they exhibit art from around the world. The "artists" are everyday
people and mostly remain unknown, so there is no pressure on the viewer to acknowledge
something as a masterpiece even if it doesn’t feel that way just because of the
name at the bottom.
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| The mighty antelope wins the stool |
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| Only a brave man will stand under a big tree |
This week we went to see the 36 Asafo flags from Ghana that
were on display. The “Asafo” were
military organizations that wielded power over towns in Ghana. These
organizations were often in violent conflict with each other and their flags
depicted either proverbs or sayings that were intended to put fear into the
heart of their enemies. These days this has morphed into friendly competitions
and rivalries.
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| Think twice before taking on the eagles |
Flags by their nature are political symbols and are often
used in ceremonial associations. So I’ve never viewed flags as art and never
associated art with armed militia, but these flags made me change my mind. The
flags were used as tools to communicate ideas and customs in what was primarily
an oral culture. The influence of Colonialism is also seen by the Union Jack on
some of these flags (those made before Ghana’s independence). These cotton
flags showed appliqued designs mainly of birds and hence appealed to me a bit
more than usual.
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| Trust the female spirit to protect you |
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| The wise owl who brings you luck |
And then as always Mingei invited us to create our own art
inspired by what we saw. I usually stay away from “art making” as I am quite
terrible at it. Elementary school ‘needle and thread’ efforts have left me with
very little confidence about my abilities except perhaps sewing on a loose
button. But this time my daughter cajoled me into getting my hands dirty.
Obviously we both went for birds, and obviously one can easily tell what her
bird was – an owl, and obviously one can barely guess what I made.
She came up with the idea of communicating a message through
the flags we made. Hers was a noble one. She wants more people to love owls,
and so she added a clover to hers to indicate owls can bring luck. I was struggling
with mine. She thought, given the comical nature of my bird (kilew – let’s see if
you can guess from the word blend which two birds are combined here), maybe I should
make it a fire-eating kilew, that creates dread in the hearts of those who
catch a glimpse of it.
If you are not frightened by the Kilew, I am sure you are positively frightened by my stitches. This is the stuff nightmares are made of!
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| The fire eating curlew who looks like a kiwi (hence Kilew) |
