Under a cloud, Zimbabwean sculpture returns to Princeton.
By: Michael Redmond
In a once-empty boutique space on Palmer Square, close by Mediterra, Peggy Knowlton is in her glory. Crates of Shona sculpture have arrived from Africa, containing some 500 stone carvings. Some measure in inches; they fit in the palm of one’s hand. Others require the muscle of four or five men to lift and position them. All are exquisitely wrought and they pack a powerful punch.
Setting up art exhibitions isn’t a new experience for Peggy Knowlton, a Bucks County art dealer and importer who specializes in Shona sculpture, which can only be described as the signature medium of contemporary African art.
Ms. Knowlton fell in love with Shona sculpture in the 1970s, when Zimbabwe was still known as Rhodesia. Her love became a passion and then a business, but a business that reflects the love and the passion she feels for the art and the artists. Ms. Knowlton arranges and curates sculpture exhibitions for the benefit of nonprofit organizations. Everybody’s interests are served the nonprofits, who need the money; the artists, who need the money, and the curator, too, whose job isn’t easy.
Now open at 43 Hulfish St., Princeton, is the latest installment of "Stone Sculpture from Zimbabwe," the largest benefit of the year for HomeFront, a Lawrence-based independent nonprofit agency which provides front-line support to homeless families in Mercer County. According to Connie Mercer, HomeFront’s executive director, the agency’s clients are the working poor.
"Everybody works, but 40 hours a week isn’t enough to enable some people to put a roof over their baby’s head. There has been a 50 percent decrease in affordable housing in Mercer County since 1990," Ms. Mercer said, "and there’s just no support for the working poor. As government increasingly gets out of social services, our resources are being stretched to the limit."
The annual sale of Shona sculpture has been enormously helpful to HomeFront, Ms. Mercer said, but both she and Ms. Knowlton are worried.
Zimbabwe is in turmoil. This year was the first since 1983 that Ms. Knowlton did not travel to arrange for acquisitions personally. According to a HomeFront press release, this year’s exhibition and sale (the 10th annual) "may very well be the last for the foreseeable future. Not only are the sculptors’ lives imperiled in the fierce fighting among political factions, (it) has become almost impossible to ship what work they are able to create."
For Ms. Knowlton, it’s not just business. It’s personal. "I know all the artists their families, their lifestyles, everything," she said.
An international phenomenon, today’s Shona sculpture is a mid-20th century revival of a folk tradition of the Shona people Zimbabwe’s largest ethnic group that dates back a thousand years. As any visitor to the Princeton exhibition can see, there’s something extraordinary about Zimbabwean stone serpentine, opalstone, jade, verdite, multi-hued Kwekwe serpentine and about the spiritual intensity of the artists who work in it.
"I personally believe that Zimbabwean sculpture is in its strongest and most creative period," Ms. Knowlton said. Within three generations, Shona sculpture has evolved from contemporary interpretations of traditional themes to sculptures influenced by Western abstraction and by the sculptors’ personal visions.
Among the important sculptors represented in the Princeton show are Brighton Sango, who died in 1995, Dominic Benhura and Colleen Madamombe.
"This show has been a success for HomeFront thanks to the wonderfulness of so many people, and we hope that it will continue, year after year," said Ms. Mercer. "This is the right event for us because the Shona people, in their lives and in their art, are so committed to family and community. And that’s what we’re about, too."
Formerly the Exchange Club of Greater Princeton, HomeFront provides meals, housing assistance, employment location services, tutorial programs, back-to-school clothing drives and other services.
"Our mission is to break the cycle of homelessness, once and for all," Ms. Mercer said.
HomeFront’s "Stone Sculpture from Zimbabwe" runs through Sunday, June 16, at 43 Hulfish St. in Palmer Square, Princeton. Exhibit hours are from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. The exhibition is open to the public. There is no admission.
Leading benefactors of HomeFront’s "Stone Sculpture from Zimbabwe" are Palmer Square Management LLC and Pennington Printers.
HomeFront is located at 1880 Princeton Ave., Lawrence Township 08648, and can be reached by calling (609) 989-9417. The organization’s Web site is www.homefrontnj.org.