Office Artifacts: Cynthia Becker
College of Fine Arts professor’s African art collection reflects a lifetime of research and travel
Click on the icons above to see more of what Cynthia Becker displays in her office.
Cynthia Becker grew up in New Orleans, a city largely shaped by African influences—a background that sparked her early curiosity about traveling to Africa.
A Boston University College of Arts & Sciences professor of African art history and chair of the History of Art & Architecture program, Becker studied anthropology as an undergrad at the University of New Orleans. She went on to pursue her graduate and PhD degrees at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Although she initially focused on archaeology, it was an art history class that helped her discover what she wanted to pursue as a career.
“African art history is a discipline that’s so interdisciplinary—it combines archaeology, anthropology, visual arts, language study, dance performance,” says Becker, who is on sabbatical this semester.
During her graduate studies, Becker became fascinated by the indigenous Amazigh people, an ethnic group largely from North and West Africa widely known for their textile traditions.
Her office is a symphony of color and texture, reflected in the numerous objects and artwork decorating walls and shelves. But one object in the corner immediately draws visitors’ attention: an altar dedicated to Yemaya, a Yoruba water spirit (the Yoruba are one of the largest ethnic groups in Nigeria).
“I love the water, and I love the ocean, so I made this altar,” Becker says. “I used to teach a class where I would have students either make altars to African spirits or an altar to an ancestor. And so I made this as an example.”
The altar features items she collected during her travels, including seashells, a candle, a crown, a shaker, a flamingo feather, and a beaded necklace.
“The idea is you’re pleasing the spirit, and so then positive things will happen to you in your lifetime,” Becker says. “So if you feel like something’s stopping you, it might be because you’re not paying homage to your spirit, and the spirit is angry and negatively impacting your life.”
Becker often likes to bring artifacts into the classroom when she’s teaching—for instance, a milk gourd from the seminomadic Maasai people of Kenya and northern Tanzania. She encourages students to touch its intricate decorative beading, smell inside, and pass it around.
“Because African art is not just visual, it’s meant to be experienced with all the senses—the sound of a shaker, the smell of incense, the touch of henna [hand] art, food placed at the altar of Yemaya,” she says. She also incorporates videos of African performances in her curriculum.
“When the Chi wara headdress is worn [during a dance], there’s drumming and singing, but when we see African art like that on display in a museum, we lose out on that experience,” Becker says. “I really try to make African art come alive in the class, so that it’s not just a two-dimensional look at something visually, it’s a whole embodied experience.”