The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art has announced the exhibition “Tsedaye Makonnen—Sanctuary.” Opening December 13, 2024 and remaining an ongoing display, the exhibition features seven sculptures by Washington, D.C.-based Ethiopian American artist Tsedaye Makonnen, and it explores the invisibility and violence that Black women and their communities are often subjected to, finding connections in form and themes related to alternate depictions of the power of motherhood and sisterly solidarity.
Photo by Brad Simpson, 2024, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution
Makonnen’s seven light-tower sculptures at the center of the exhibition are made up of 50 boxes, each named after an individual lost to violence, enshrining their names with love as a form of comfort and solidarity, with a sense of hope for a different future. The artist speaks to a range of human rights issues and forms of oppression. “I am interested in representing voices that are among the most vulnerable,” Makonnen said.
“Community engagement is a core element of our museum, which was founded to promote cross-cultural understanding,” said John K. Lapiana, director of the National Museum of African Art. “Tsedaye’s exhibition speaks to these longstanding values of the National Museum of African Art.”
“Outside of Ethiopia, the DC metropolitan area has the largest Ethiopian diaspora. As an Ethiopian-born woman and longtime champion of DC artists, it is deeply meaningful that this is the exhibition opening coincides with the start of my tenure at the National Museum of African Art,” said Heran Sereke-Brhan, the museum’s deputy director. “Having Tsedaye’s work exhibited at the Smithsonian is a powerful way to center stories of oppression and resilience while countering underrepresentation in the arts.”
Makonnen envisioned the central installation in this exhibition, “Senait & Nahom: The Peacemaker & The Comforter,” while she was an artist in residence for the National Museum of African Art as a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellow. The sculptures are in dialogue with artworks from across the Horn of Africa’s history drawn from the museum’s permanent collection.
Makonnen worked with National Museum of African Art curator Kevin D. Dumouchelle to select the objects, which include examples of the types of Ethiopian Coptic crosses that directly informed the artist’s research and work, as well as related works by Ethiopian artists that express visions of motherhood and comfort, from medieval icons to works by contemporary artists Alexander “Skunder” Boghossian and Aïda Muluneh.
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