Vues d'Esprits
Newspaper on the First Arts
   
 
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__ Cameroon: a part of the patrimony bandjoun flies away in smoke
A fire, probably of criminal origin, destroyed during the night of Wednesday to Thursday traditional buildings and antiques of the chefferie of Bandjoun, on the West Cameroon. The site, based in 17th century, consists of a royal palace, a museum, and various compartments in the architecture typically bamilékée.
__ The chefferie of Bandjoun, in 300km of Yaounde (Cameroon), was got by a fire during the night of Wednesday to Thursday. Flames destroyed a traditional building decorated with sculptures, called the Big Compartment of the people, two compartments said "secret societies" dating 1930s, as well as the reserve of the museum of the Palace. This one contained approximately one thousand objects which were a part of collections of king and of dignitaries: statuettes, thrones, jewels in pearls, suits, masks, potteries, bronzes and tissues bamiléké. Among these details, some dated the 18th century. The archives of the palace, which cover the history of the royal family in 20th century, were there also. The inventory of the reserve had hardly just begun. The showroom perms of the museum, where are 122 details, fortunately intact house. Old woman of three centuries, the chefferie of Bandjoun is the one more important of Cameroon and account 200 000 members. In the center of the Palace is the Big Compartment of the people, used as conference room for the dignitaries. 23 metres high with a thatched roof resting on 60 sculptured wooden pillars, she is considered as the " key monument of the country bamiléké . The building, based in 18th century, is regularly reconstructed since. The museum was create in 2003 from a gallery of exhibition of collections opened in the 1960s, by means of an Italian non-governmental organisation ( COE). A catalog on the bandjoun patrimony is going to be soon edited.

__ Paris inaugurates his African film club
On the occasion of 50 years of the cinema of Africa, the Dapper museum inaugurates in its walls, on Friday in Paris, a film club honouring the cinematographic art of the continent and the Diaspora. A monthly meeting which also offers to the public the opportunity to discuss with figures of the African cinema. The project is realized in partnership with RFI, Arte, RFO and the Exercise books of the Cinema. Interview of Catherine Ruelle, programmatrice and artistic manageress of the film club and the president of the association « Racines » at the origin of the initiative. (See article)

www.afrik.com/article8049.html
__ One of the biggest African civilizations after that of the Pharaohs, the empire of Great Zimbabwe, built by Shonas, was held between current Zimbabwe, east of Botswana and the Southeast of Mozambique, from 1100 till 1500 after J.C. A civilization in the architecture so developed that certain Europeans were persuaded that she could not be African. Dawson Munjeri, the ancient director of the world patrimony of Great Zimbabwe, returns on the history of this empire of exception which is not without calling back to me the big constructions attributed to Gan, to some kilometres of the village of Loropeni in the Southwest of the Burkina Faso (continuation) www.afrik.com/article7909.html

__ Historic peace agreements in Casamance

The Senegalese authorities and the Movement of the democratic forces of Casamance ( MFDC) have to sign, on Friday, 31, an agreement of historic peace. History, because, contrary to the precedents, all the watches of the MFDC agree to initial the text which has to put an end to more than 20 war years. If the negotiations which follow the signature take place well, Casamance should be able to accelerate its reconstruction to become again a tourist appreciated destination and an agricultural fishpond for the rest of the country.

__ The future of the Palace of the Golden Door

Announced in July, 2004 by Mr Raffarin, the Palace of the Golden Door will become « Quoted National of the History of the Immigration ». This Museum should open its doors in the year 2007 with an inaugural exhibition on « Colonization and Immigration ».
__ In the fifties, the artist native of the Ivory Coast Frédéric Bruly Bouabré, invents a writing from his language, Bété.
To create its alphabet, it pulls of the language Bété, inspired by the pebbles of Békora (village on the West of Côte d'Ivoire), 400 monosyllabic words and represents them in the form of pictograms. The writing of Bruly Bouabré is a combination of these pictograms. At present, only some initiated practise its writing, but its drawings circulate in the museums of the whole world.
Today, old about 80 years, F.B Bouabré, narrator, rigorous archivist of the material documents and the oral traditions who crossed all his life to study the testimonies of the cultural past of the African continent, made the study of a film to realize by Nurith Aviv. It is this film which will be scheduled on January 15th, 2005 on Arte.
__ A new museum of ethnography in Geneva...

__ The ancient museum based by Eugène Pittard in 1901 will see its collections changed place for a new museum the place of which is not defined yet.
We remember that in 1976, an appendix was opened to Conches, but this extension does not manage to resolve all the thorough problems.
In 2001, a credit is voted by two thirds of the City Council but will see itself refused by referendum of the city. Finally, a workgroup is established and an agreement signed between various parties. This new building of neighborhood 9000 square meters will include three spaces established by a forum, by a space of exhibitions and by a research center. He will want to be a place of knowledge, search and understanding on all which touches the human phenomenon.
Let us wish them all the success which deserves such a project.
 
 
__ The discovery of a new town Maya in Guatemala questions the chronology established for this surprising civilization of Central America. To Cival, the team of Francisco Estrada-Belli brought to light the vestiges of a complex city with its place, its palaces, its ramparts and of a very developed culture. Nevertheless, Cival is previous to the key period of the civilization maya, said 'classical author', who would have begun only towards 250 after JC.

__ Cival would have been lived between 600 before JC and 100 after JC, dates to whom she was brutally abandoned. Two magnificent masks of stucco were discovered by Francisco Estrada-Belli. One of them, being about 4,5 metres on 3 metres, represents a face the square mouth of which is endowed with hooks of snake. The archaeologists also found 120 details of polite jade, a place of ceremony and the registrations engraved on a stony paving stone.

__ Previous discoveries had already questioned the conception of a civilization preclassic maya established by farmers' simple villages. So to El Mirador, always in Guatemala, a town of 100.000 inhabitants, with a very advanced culture, existed from 500 before JC. If he is even time, the chronologies of time maya must be rewritten.