The Fowler Museum at UCLA recently debuted the much-anticipated exhibition, “The House Was Too Small: Yoruba Sacred Arts from Africa and Beyond,” bringing together over 100 sacred artworks including carved sculpture, colorful crowns and headdresses, vibrant beadwork, dazzling costumes, and other art forms.
For the opening, Ifa practitioner, artist, and abolitionist Patrisse Cullors prepared a special live performance of “Ori Whispers.” Cullors and a group of women — dressed in white and tied together by long black plaits of hair — processed barefoot from the UCLA Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden to the Fowler in a celebration of Black femme strength and power. The visually and spiritually dynamic procession drew a rapt crowd of nearly 1,300 attendees.
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The celebration also commemorated the Fowler’s 60th anniversary. Over the course of its storied history, the Fowler has acquired a collection of more than 120,000 art and ethnographic and 600,000 archaeological objects representing ancient, traditional, and contemporary cultures.
“The House Was Too Small” unfolds over five rooms devoted to objects that visualize and enact core spiritual tenets and draws from the Fowler collection from Nigeria, Benin, and across the Yoruba diaspora of Brazil, Cuba, and the U.S.
Fowler staff worked with a collective of religious practitioners, academics, activists, and artists — including Cullors — to develop the exhibition. Community advisors authored a selection of labels for personally meaningful objects. These texts offer insights gleaned from religious training, scholarly research, artistic vision, and lived experience.
The exhibition contains a series of works by Cullors, for whom Yoruba religiosity is a mode of personal and collective empowerment. This aspect of her faith is realized in “Free Us,” a multipart installation. Cullors says the installation is for young people looking for spiritual meaning.
“I want young people, especially Black and Brown, to know there is a tradition beyond the Abrahamaic that may be calling them. Getting to sit on an advisory committee feels historic, powerful,” said Cullors. “It’s a dream come true.”
In the first room, a silent video short, “They Are With Us,” looks at the beauty and enchantment of Orishas, Yoruba divinities. The camera cuts between ocean waves and undulating layers of a rich fabric ensemble worn by Cullors. She is wearing a crown adorned with cowrie shells and a beaded veil hangs over her eyes.
A second room features “UnEarthing Altars,” four deconstructed altars each dedicated to an orisha. The altars are composed of objects from the Fowler collection alongside Cullors’ personal offerings: cloth, shells, kola nut, and elaborate crowns fabricated by KUTULA by Africana, a Los Angeles-based African fashion and design house.
“Free Us is a powerful and poetic intervention that explores the vitality and resonance of Black spirituality across time and geographies,” said Silvia Forni, Shirley & Ralph Shapiro Director of the Fowler Museum. “It brings these African traditions to this place and time and highlights the importance of spiritual practice as a grounding and freeing force.”
The exhibition will remain on view through June 2, 2024.
