This accession documents closed, denied, and unfinished exhibitions at the National Museum of African Art (NMAfA). These records contain correspondence, research, notes, checklists, label texts, brochures, floor plans and designs, clippings, loan information, photographs, slides, transparencies, and negatives. Some materials are in electronic ...

This accession consists of drawings documenting the planning and design of exhibitions and other projects by the Office of Exhibits Central (OEC). OEC designs exhibitions for the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service as well as for Smithsonian Institution museums and units without internal exhibition design offices or which need...

Picture postcards collected by Stephen Grant, Education Official, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), while serving in Africa.

This accession consists mostly of exhibit scripts for Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service projects. Materials include memoranda, correspondence, manuscripts, photocopies of articles from journals, sketches and drawings, architectural blueprints, brochures, cost accounting summaries, photographs and slides, and maps depicting f...

These records were created by Kenneth Victor Young during his tenure in the Office of Exhibits Central (OEC) as a designer and Design Supervisor and Editor. The records consist of Young's exhibition script outlines and designs, mostly for the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES); memoranda and correspondence to and fro...

This collection is comprised of photographic and manuscript materials, primarily created by Eliot Elisofon to document his travels and work. The images portray many aspects of African life and culture including agriculture, wildlife, archaeology, architecture, art and artisans, children, cityscapes and landscapes, leaders, markets, medicine, recreation, ritual and celebration, and transportation. The manuscript materials include correspondence, essays, clippings, puobligations, notes, research, and itineraries.

Publications, photographs, articles, audio and video recordings, and teaching materials relating to the rise of Macrobiotics in the United States, as popularized by Michio and Aveline Kushi. The bulk of the material was produced for the Kushi Foundation, Kushi Institute, and East West Foundation.

The collection consists of 6,567 color slides taken by Dr. Marilyn Houlberg during various field studies among the Yoruba in southwest Nigeria between 1961 and circa 2005. The images depict Yoruba art and culture with a special focus on artisans, art objects, body arts, costume, festivals, hairstyles, indigenous photography, weaving and textiles. Cultural events depicted include Balufon festivals, Egungun and Gelede masquerades, social events (weddings, christenings, funerals), and religious ceremonies (initiation and animal sacrifice). Also included are various scenes of daily life, architecture, food preparation, markets, portraits and landscapes. Houlberg extensively documented Yoruba artists in the process of creating their art, including carvers Yesufu Ejigboye, Runshewe, and Lamidi Fakeye, as well as the final pieces themselves. Houlberg documentated art in situ, such as Yoruba house posts, shrines, wall art and wood doors and art objects, including Gelede masks, Ibeji (twin) and Eshu figures, Osanyin staffs, and Ogboni and Shango shrines. Manuscript and printed materials, including Houlberg's resume, thesis, and numerous published articles are also available in this collection.

Photographs taken by Simon Ottenberg in Southeastern Nigeria within the Afikpo Village Group, at the time a group of 22 Eastern Igbo villages (sometimes considered part of the Cross River Igbo grouping) in southeastern Nigeria, while on a pre-doctoral Social Science Research Grant from December of 1951 through March of 1953 and during field research from September of 1959 to December of 1960. Also included are photographs taken from June of 1960 to December of 1960 of Abakaliki, a town and the administrative center of the northestern Igbo people, north of Afikpo. According to Dr. Ottenberg in his publication about masked Afikpo rituals, "The Afikpo belong to an Igbo subgroup called Ada or Edda (Forde and Jones 1950, pp. 51-56), which includes the Okpaha, Edda, Amaseri, and Unwana village-groups, all of which border on the Afikpo, and the Nkporo and Adaeze, both short distances away" (Masked Rituals of Afikpo, 1975, p. 3).

This accession consists of records documenting exhibitions mounted by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES). Materials include itineraries, slides, news clippings, scripts, press releases, shipping documents, checklists, loan records, correspondence, photographs, lists, motion pictures, videotapes, audiotapes, a...