EXPLORERS HALL MUSEUM TO HOST RARE COLLECTION OF AFRICAN ART

WASHINGTON—Rarely seen artifacts from the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection of African Art, including several that date from the 15th and 16th centuries, will be exhibited at the National Geographic Explorers Hall museum Aug. 30, 2001, to Feb. 28, 2002.

“Artist as Explorer: African Art from the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection” will include 60 pieces, from majestic sculptures, reliquary heads, masks and headdresses to doors, a drum, a gravepost, and a divination bag and tray.

The oldest pieces on display will be an intricately carved ivory hunting horn from Sierra Leone, dating from around 1492 to 1516, in the style of the Sapi Portuguese people; an ivory saltcellar made by the Edo peoples of Nigeria in the 16th century; and an ivory armlet made in the 16th century, possibly for the king of Owu, Nigeria, with interlocking and free-moving parts so technically advanced as to be rarely equaled in world arts. Most of the other exhibits date from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Paul and Ruth Tishman began collecting African art in the 1960s. Their collection was bought by Disney Enterprises Inc. and is seldom publicly displayed. The Explorers Hall exhibit marks the first time so many objects from the Walt Disney-Tishman Collection have been shown since an exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1981.

Philippe de Montebello, then director of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, said the collection was “one of the finest in private hands.”

“Artist as Explorer” is part of a series of exhibits and live programs about Africa taking place at National Geographic Society headquarters this fall in conjunction with a major eight-part National Geographic Television series, “Africa,” premiering on PBS Sept. 9, 2001. The Society will publish Africa, by John Reader, a companion book to the series, in September.

“Giraffe of the Sahara,” an 18-foot-high aluminum cast of a 7,000-year-old rock engraving of a pair of giraffes found in the Sudan, will be displayed in the courtyard of 1600 M Street from Aug. 15, 2001, to Feb. 28, 2002. A photographic exhibition, “African Retrospective: A Century of Photography,” showing how Africa has been captured in National Geographic magazine from 1909 to the present, will be held from Sept. 12, 2001, to Nov. 4, 2001. An interactive exhibit, “Megatransect: Trek Across Africa,” which traces conservationist Michael Fay’s 15-month, 2,000-mile walk across the continent, will be displayed from Sept. 12, 2001, to Feb. 28, 2002.

An African street fair will be held in the courtyard on M Street in front of Society headquarters on Sept. 15, 2001, featuring a day of free activities such as animal presentations, Ghanaian dancers, soccer games, films, storytelling and arts and crafts.

Live presentations of African arts such as traditional music, dance and storytelling will be given in Explorers Hall every Friday from August 2001 to February 2002 as part of National Geographic’s ongoing Passport Fridays program.

Explorers Hall is on the first floor of the National Geographic Society headquarters at 17th and M Streets, N.W. It is open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. It is closed Christmas day.

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