Cape Coast Castle. 1653 Sweden, 1665 Britain
Paa Joe
Accra-based artist and craftsman Paa Joe (b. 1947), known for his figurative coffins that draw from the traditional Ghanaian custom of abebuu adekai, gained international recognition in seminal presentations like Magicians of the Earth (Pompidou, 1989). This exhibition presents a unique series of large-scale painted wood sculptures commissioned in 2004 and 2005—architectural models of Gold Coast castles and forts that served as way stations for more than six million Africans sold into slavery and sent to the Americas and the Caribbean between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. Once forced through these “Gates of No Return,” they started an irreversible, perilous journey during which many died. This production alludes to Paa Joe’s coffins, seen as vessels ferrying the dead in the afterlife, speaking to spirits separated from bodies in trauma. Archival documents and recordings accompany the show.
Curator: Valérie Rousseau, curator, Self-Taught Art and Art Brut, American Folk Art Museum
Installation photos by Olya Vysotskaya.
Critical Walk-Through: Cy Gavin
Curator’s Perspective Tour
Gallery Talk: New Perspectives with Teaching Fellows
Gallery Talk: New Perspectives with Teaching Fellows
Walls Can Speak: Sites, Memorials, and Social Justice
Family Story Hour: Celebrating Paa Joe’s Ghana
Critical Walk-Through: Nari Ward
Screening of Paa Joe & The Lion and Ghanaian Drumming Performance
2019 Anne Hill Blanchard Uncommon Artists Lecture
Gallery Talk: New Perspectives with Teaching Fellows
Gallery Talk: New Perspectives with Teaching Fellows
Book Talk with Dr. Cheryl Finley—Committed to Memory: The Art of the Slave Ship Icon
Images: Paa Joe (1947, Ghana); Cape Coast Castle – Cape Coast. 1653 Sweden, 1665 Britain; 2004–2005 and 2017; Accra, Ghana; emele wood and enamel; 45 x 133 x 88 in.; American Folk Art Museum, gift in memory of Claude Simard, 2018.13.1. Photo © Paa Joe, courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.
Paa Joe (1947, Ghana); Fort St. Anthony – Axim. 1515 Portugal, 1642 Netherlands, 1872 Britain; 2004–2005 and 2017; Accra, Ghana; emele wood and enamel; 48 1/2 x 100 x 84 1/2 in.; courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York. Photo © Paa Joe, courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.
Paa Joe (1947, Ghana); [Fort] Gross-Friedrichsburg – Princestown. 1683 Brandenburg, 1717-24 Ahanta, 1724 Neths, 1872 Britain; 2004–2005 and 2017; Accra, Ghana; emele wood and enamel; 40 x 100 x 70 in.; courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York. Photo © Paa Joe, courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.
Paa Joe (1947, Ghana); Cape Coast Castle – Cape Coast. 1653 Sweden, 1665 Britain; 2004–2005 and 2017; Accra, Ghana; emele wood and enamel; 45 x 133 x 88 in.; American Folk Art Museum, gift in memory of Claude Simard, 2018.13.1. Photo © Paa Joe, courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.
This exhibition is supported in part by the David Davies and Jack Weeden Fund for Exhibitions, the Ford Foundation, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, and the Council for Self-Taught Art.
- The Paris Review
This exhibition is supported in part by the David Davies and Jack Weeden Fund for Exhibitions, the Ford Foundation, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, and the Council for Self-Taught Art.
