Analysis Of The Divine Comedy

The Divine Comedy is an exhibit that is being revisited and created by a “group of forty of the best known emerging artist from 8 different African nations,” based off the 4th century poem “the divine comedy” written by Dante Alighieri. At the National African Art History museum in Washington, DC and this year happens to be the 50th anniversary of the museum of the opening of the original Capitol Hill museum founded by Warren Robbins and Johnetta Cole June 3, 1964. It tells a story about life by dividing it into three layers in life that identify and portray the mind of human life in a religious frame of mind. The exhibit o has a creative way of showing how that we live life in layers, Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. You enter the museum on the

Floor one was based off of the theme of heaven, while in “Heaven” the lights are bright; the back ground is white, while the air and atmosphere is calm and relaxed. Words have different meanings to everyone who reads or uses them, and each floor of the Divine Comedy expresses that, so naturally the sub section based off heaven is no different. As one walks around you see the different definitions of Heaven for each of the artist that created special piece for this section. As you enter on the walls is a painted quote, “And then it was clear to me how everything in heaven is paradise, and yet the grace of highest good my differ there in measure.” A very blunt way of sharing that heaven has different meaning for everyone. As you slowly step around and are overwhelmed by all the different displays of heaven and their meaning one you can help but stare at is “The Binding”

On display in the beginning of this back room was a bunch of different sizes bowls that were well decorated, crafted, and painted. In this section I learn that “In 1954 Ladi Kwali became the first woman member of a pottery training center established in Abuja, Nigeria and still remains its best known artist skilled in tradition methods of hand-built pottery.” Which is metaphoric because usually the pottery was created by women, crafting its shape, size, and designs all by hand; they used wood to help create and be a mold for the shape of the pots. These pots were used daily naturally for various reasoning’s like cooking and storing water, during dry months or so that the women wouldn’t have to walk far from the villages to fetch the water. Some of them had coloring to them and I’m sure this came from plant dyes, the pottery was known to be very fragile and heavy, which is not hard to understand why given their circumstances. With the coloring the colors can convey important messages but may not always be symbolic or have a meaning depending on the culture. African cultures vary in meaning and traditions as it comes to the design work and colors of their materials and clothing. Bowling making goes hand in hand with the African baskets and weaving which is a huge part of the culture and daily life of African