id: 308829
accession number: 2018.4
share license status: Copyrighted
url: https://clevelandart.org/art/2018.4
updated: 2022-01-04 18:07:35.347000
Twilight of the Idols (Fetish) 3, 2005. Kendell Geers (South African, b. 1968). Wood, plastic tape (polyethylene, polypropylene, nylon, or vinyl), and iron; overall: 140 x 43 x 39 cm (55 1/8 x 16 15/16 x 15 3/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Purchased with funds donated by Scott Mueller 2018.4 © Kendell Geers
title: Twilight of the Idols (Fetish) 3
title in original language:
series:
series in original language:
creation date: 2005
creation date earliest: 2005
creation date latest: 2005
current location:
creditline: Purchased with funds donated by Scott Mueller
copyright: © Kendell Geers
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culture: South Africa
technique: Wood, plastic tape (polyethylene, polypropylene, nylon, or vinyl), and iron
department: African Art
collection: African Art
type: Sculpture
find spot:
catalogue raisonne:
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CREATORS
* Kendell Geers (South African, b. 1968) - artist
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measurements: Overall: 140 x 43 x 39 cm (55 1/8 x 16 15/16 x 15 3/8 in.)
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edition of the work:
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CURRENT EXHIBITIONS
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LEGACY EXHIBITIONS
* AfroPunk. Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels, Belgium. (September 7-October 28, 2017)
* Kendell Geers, 1988-2012. Haus der Kunst, Munich, DE (February 1-May 12, 2013)
* The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Blandy-les-Tours Castle, in collaboration with Galleria Continua, Blandy-les-Tours, France (June 30-July 10, 2012)
* Fin de Partie. Galleria Continua, Beijing, China (March 19-August 27, 2011)
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PROVENANCE
(Studio Kendell Geers, Brussels, Belgium, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art
date: 2018
footnotes:
citations:
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
date: 2018-
footnotes:
citations:
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fun fact:
The underlying figure is much larger than minkisi figures were in the past; its "supersize" reflects that it is an object made for the tourist market, not for ritual use.
digital description:
wall description:
To create this sculpture, Kendell Geers appropriates a nkisi nkondi (singular) sculpture of the Kongo people that was mass-produced for the tourist market. Minkisi (plural) figures were typically used as protective relics; the nails on it represent the many times the object would have been ritually activated. Geers wraps the object with white and red chevron tape—the South African equivalent of yellow and black caution tape used in the US to mark off the scene of a crime—simultaneously signaling danger and acting as a shield. The artist’s deliberate use of the term fetish recalls African ritual objects’ fetishization as art and global commodities by the West since the turn of the 20th century. While once used in scholarship to describe African religious objects like nkisi, the word 'fetish' is now understood as both inaccurate and inappropriate.
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RELATED WORKS
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CITATIONS
Geers, Kendell and Jerome Sans. “Kendell Geers: A TerroRealist in the house of Love.” In Looking both ways: Art of the contemporary African diaspora. (New York: Museum for African Art; Gent: Snoeck, 2003), 84-97, 179.
page number:
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Kendell Geers: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, 34 and 37. Exh. Cat. Blandy-les-Tours: Galleria Continua, June 30-July 10, 2012.
page number: p. 34, 37
url: http://kendellgeers.com/dbfiles/news/5booklet_final_version.pdf
Kellner, Clive, et al. Kendell Geers 1988-2012, 159. Exh. Cat. Munich; London; New York: Prestel, February 1-May 12, 2013.
page number: p. 159
url:
Geers, Kendell, Jens Hoffman, and Z. S. Strother. AniMystikAKtivist: Between Traditional and the Contemporary in African Art. Brussels: Mercatorfonds, 2018.
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Nzewi, Ugochukwu-Smooth C. "Contemporary African Art." Cleveland Art (September/October 2018): 8-9.
page number: Reproduced and mentioned: P. 8.
url: https://www.clevelandart.org/print/magazine/cleveland-art-septemberoctober-2018/contemporary-african-art
Nzewi, Ugochukwu-Smooth C. Second Careers : Two Tributaries in African Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2019
page number: Mentioned: p. 20; reproduced: p. 21, fig. 7.
url: https://ingallslibrary.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1090438741
Nzewi, Ugochukwu-Smooth C. Second Careers : Two Tributaries in African Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2019
page number: Mentioned: p. 20; reproduced: p. 21, fig. 7.
url: https://ingallslibrary.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1090438741
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IMAGES