In This World, If You Do Not Allow Your Brother to Climb, You Will Not Climb (Ama won yonko antwa nkron)

Artist: Mark Anthony (Ghanian, died 2020)
Author: (Playwright) Douglas Kobena Nyarko (Ghanaian, active 20th century)

ca. 1996–98

African Art

Mark Anthony is known as the master of Ghanaian concert painting, a genre that flourished from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s and featured handpainted posters advertising traveling theatrical performances. This poster depicts a scene from A. B. Crentsil’s Ahenfo Band production of a play written by Douglas Kobena Nyarko. The title is an Akan proverb that teaches selflessness and warns against envy through the story of a queen mother who is jealous of a beautiful younger woman. In the scene shown here, the young woman emerges from an egg, while a hunter dressed in European colonial clothing approaches. The painting was constructed in two parts that are held together by hinges, so that it could be easily moved and presented freestanding. It shows wear and tear from being carried around to different performance venues.

Audio Guides

Sarai Pridgen

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I'm Sarai Pridgen, a Yale college student and Bartel's intern in the Gallery's African Art Department.

Before us is a Ghanaian concert painting. In late 20th-century Ghana, traveling theater troupes held concert parties, popular performances advertised by massive signage called concert paintings.

Though the concert party tradition dates back as early as 1903, its popularity flourished through the 1960s into one of Ghana's most influential artistic outputs spreading even to Togo and Nigeria.

The vast wood panels you see are made to be tossed into trucks and traveled everywhere. A. B. Crentsil's Ahenfo Band commissioned this diptych concert painting from Ghanaian Master Mark Antony, for the play In This World, If You Do Not Allow Your Brother to Climb, You Will Not Climb. This is toying with the plot of Snow White and Seven Dwarves. A hunter is sent by a wicked, jealous queen mother to kill a beautiful girl.

British Colonialism's legacy lurks in the dress and weapon of the hunter who prowls at the far left. He finds the girl emerging from an egg, decides not to kill her and brings her back to the Queen alive.

Concert paintings are rife with violence, horror, absurdity, and humor. Such elements are why they're often described in terms of their literal content as terrifying or shocking and not as judgements on their beauty.

In this work, the introduction of cooking pot over human remains is written into the play, but not directly. It's just to make everybody laugh. And in the words of Dr. Gilbert, scholar of Ghanaian art, say:
"The introduction of the cooking pot on the human heads and the human bones is written into the play, but not directly. And it's just to make everybody laugh and to make everybody say, 'Oh my God. Look.'"
Medium

Mahogany, acrylic house paint, and nails

Dimensions

96 × 96 × 2 in. (243.8 × 243.8 × 5.1 cm)

Credit Line

The Charles B. Benenson, B.A. 1933, Fund

Accession Number

2019.99.1

Geography
Culture
Period

20th century

Classification
Disclaimer

Note: This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect the Yale University Art Gallery’s complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of records is ongoing.

Provenance

Provenance

A.B. Crentsil, Ghana, 1996–1997; Michelle Gilbert, Guilford, Conn, 1997–2019; Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn.
Bibliography
  • "Selected Acquisitions," Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin (2020–21), 138, ill.
Object copyright
Additional information

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