11:00 am – 1:00 pm
5th Floor Seminar Room, Italian Academy for Advanced Study, 1161 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY, 10027
Africa & Byzantium at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Dr. Andrea Achi
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Art history has long emphasized the glories of the Byzantine Empire (circa 330–1453), but less known are the profound artistic contributions of North Africa, Egypt, Nubia, Ethiopia, and other powerful African kingdoms whose pivotal interactions with Byzantium had a lasting impact on the Mediterranean world. Bringing together a range of masterworks—from mosaic, sculpture, pottery, and metalwork to luxury objects, paintings, and religious manuscripts— Africa & Byzantium recounts Africa’s central role in international networks of trade and cultural exchange. With artworks rarely or never before seen in public, this exhibition sheds new light on the staggering artistic achievements of medieval Africa. This long-overdue exhibition highlights how the continent contributed to the development of the premodern world and offers a more complete history of the vibrant multiethnic societies of north and east Africa that shaped the artistic, economic, and cultural life of Byzantium and beyond.
In this lecture, Met Curator, Andrea Myers Achi, will present an overview of the main themes and key loans of her exhibition, which opens on November 19th, 2023. She will also share the process of developing a large-scale loan exhibition that builds on The Met’s legacy of groundbreaking exhibitions on Byzantium.
