From the accession of Afonso I to the Kongo throne in 1509 to its final dissolution in 1914, the Kongo in central Africa was a Christian kingdom whose status was recognized throughout the early modern Atlantic world. Remarkably, Christianity developed there at the demand and under the control of the Kongo crown itself, outside the context of colonization (but not apart from European contact). After adopting the new religion, the Kongo underwent a major redefinition of its visual culture: local and foreign forms were brought together to create a distinct expression of Kongo Christianity, one that helped ensure the Kongo’s place in the realm of Christendom. This process of visual inculturation is the topic of Cécile Fromont’s new book, The Art of Conversion: Christian Visual Culture in the Kingdom of Kongo (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2014).
The book contains ninety-three halftones, thirty-seven of which are duplicated as color plates in a center insert. Disappointingly, the majority of these images are paintings by Europeans—mostly Italian missionaries from the Capuchin-Franciscan order, who arrived in the Kongo in 1645 and created didactic watercolors with glosses that describe their work there; scenes include missionaries performing wedding and funeral ceremonies, hearing confessions, blessing courtly performances, and leading processions. Other European images include oil paintings of Kongo ambassadors by a Dutch court artist (as pictured on the cover), observational drawings and prints by visitors from various countries, and imported devotional objects, such as statuettes of saints.
Indigenous objects pictured in the book include crucifixes, swords, staffs, pendants, carved tusks, mpu caps, textiles, and minkisi minkondi (nail figures). Fromont discusses how these objects functioned in Kongo society. Continue reading
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