Skunder Boghossian: A Different Magnificence

Abstract

Alexander (Skunder) Boghossian is one of Africa's most distinctive and original artists. He comes from a culture where tradition is old and powerful. Ethiopia has a long tradition of wall painting in churches and of illustrated manuscripts reaching back to the eighth century. It is from this cultural fountain that once included three-fourths of Ancient Egypt, the builders of the great pyramids and the cradle of civilization, that he drank the succulent substance of creativity. The spirits of his ancestors embraced him and formed the basis for an art, significant and enriching, imbued with power. Here he was trained and prepared in spirit, mind and technique to develop as communicator and perpetuator of the cultural heritage of Africa. Receiving a scholarship to study abroad, he spent eleven years (19551966) in Europe. In Paris, Skunder studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, La Grande Chaumiere, and with leading artists (e.g. Braque, Giacometti, Breton). He allowed himself to be absorbed to some extent by the Parisian art life, mastering all the techniques, but creating his own mythology and images around which he could orient his aesthetic statement. His stay abroad did not produce a mime of foreign models; instead, those trends of modern art were digested, massaged, and moulded into his own style. In January of 1964, at the Galerie Lambert in Paris, Skunder's first big breakthrough came with the canvas, pastel, gouache and pen-and-ink series Nourishers. The general theme of these compositions was the creative process, the generation of life, evidenced by such titles as Life Giver, Birth, Fertility Goddess, etc. The series demonstrates Skunder's manner of spiritualizing things, revealing the reality they conceal-a form of interpenetration. The Paris critics were virtually unanimous in their positive appraisal of the exhibition, which was important to Skunder's development as an artist.