Presence of a Fundamental Absence

This artwork is a powerful statement on collecting, representation, and display. By embedding found objects from Senegal into the very walls of the museum, the artists flip the traditional dynamic of a Museum deciding what artifacts are “worthy” of exhibition and how they are shown. The juxtaposition of disparate objects—from a tea kettle to bones to handmade ceramic artwork—speaks to both the place the artists are from and to the disparate materials acquired by this museum over time.