Challenges to rural festivals with the return to democratic rule in southeastern Nigeria.

The last fifteen years have seen a major shift in the study of African art. Beginning as a discipline largely devoted to' the study of rural art forms in their religious and social contexts, it is now mainly focused on urban artists working as part of an increasingly globalized art world. This can be demonstrated simply by looking at the program of the Triennial Symposium on African Art, the content of articles in African Arts, or the themes of research of most recent and current graduate students. At recent conferences, such as the 2004 Triennial Symposium on African Arts, there has been an increasing gulf between those scholars studying the recent urban arts and those who deal with rural artistic practices. More than a thematic or temporal division, it is a methodological one. While it seems natural to study urban arts in their political and global dimensions, rural arts are still seen mainly as the products of a world that is insulated from national and international political and economic factors. The case can be made, however, for viewing rural artistic practices not as part of the traditional past, but as part of the present. The response of a contemporary rural festival in southeastern Nigeria to changes in the national scene provides an example.

For the last 250 years, the Ikeji or New Yam festival, ostensibly a celebration of the yam harvest, has served as a communal event bringing together the Aro people of southeastern Nigeria while allowing for the renegotiation of status and access to political power by its subgroups (Bentor 1995). The Aro people, an amalgam of several Igbo, Ibibio, and Cross River ethnic elements, first came together in the late seventeenth or early eighteenth century to fight a war against a group of Ibibio people. They relied on the power of their famed oracle, the ibiniukpabi (or "Long Juju" as it was called by the British), located at the Aro base of Arochukwu, to build a trading network throughout the region. With the increasing demand for slaves, the Aro became the main slave dealers of the interior, exchanging slaves for imported commodities with coastal communities including Calabar, Bonny, and later Opobo (Dike and Ekejiuba 1990:118-23). With the demise of the slave trade, the Aro used their slave-trading contacts to establish a network of settlements throughout southeastern Nigeria specializing in the cultivation and trade of palm oil. As the nineteen villages that comprised Arochukwu built different spheres of trading partners and settlements, each village has had a distinct set of encounters with the different cultural and artistic zones of the very heterogenous cultural landscape of southeastern Nigeria (Cole and Aniakor 1984).

In most Aro settlements, the Ikeji festival serves to foster ties with Arochukwu and to distinguish the Aro from the indigenous peoples among whom they settled. Arondizuogu in central Igboland is the largest Aro settlement. It comprises a small number of descendants of the original Aro settlers and a large number of their so-called dependents, who were brought here from the Anambra area to the north. Together the two groups adjusted the Aro Ikeji to reflect these new realities. While at Arochukwu the Ikeji is a harvest festival celebrating the new crop of yams around September, at Arondizuogu the festival is held at the beginning of the farming season in April, the same season as the major festivals in both central Igboland and the region to the north where the dependents came from. The prevailing genre of masking at Arondizuogu is the Mmanwu of the Anambra region (Fig. 2). Mmanwu is not found at Arochukwu.

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

At Arochukwu, the original center of the Aro, the Ikeji is a complex event lasting twenty-three days. Each day of the Ikeji brings together different segments of the community in reenactments of different events of Aro history. On the culminating day of the festival, each of the nineteen villages that make up the polity of Arochukwu performs a masquerade or a women's dance at the communal square. The internal administrative structure of Arochukwu divides the community into four segments based on their respective areas of origin: two Igbo sections, one Ibibio, and the Akpa, whose origin is on the other side of the Cross River. Some of the masking genres at Arochukwu reflect these diverse origins. Additionally, each of the nineteen villages adopted different masking genres based on its trading contacts and its specific settlement area (Fig. 3). Standing at the communal square on that day, one can see masking genres from throughout southeastern Nigeria. The various genres of masks each village uses serve as markers of its specific historical experience (Fig. 1). Thus, the Aro come to celebrate their unity by demonstrating their diversity (Bentor 1995:169-206).

[FIGURES 1 & 3 OMITTED]

In my earlier research, I demonstrated that the festival is more than just the arena for the reaffirmation of communal bonds. By foregrounding ties that hold the community together, the Aro Ikeji festival provides an opportunity for the different segments of Aro society to adjust their relative status and access to power (Bentor 1995:283-312). These precarious mechanisms are under severe stress as a result of the current political situation in Nigeria.

Since independence, successive civil and military governments in Nigeria have continuously modified the administrative structure of the country. At independence in 1960, Nigeria consisted of three regions. Today there are thirty-six states and a Federal Capital Territory. Local Government Areas (LGAs, the equivalent of counties in the United States) often multiply and sometimes reunite with each passing regime. Yet, with all of Nigeria's volatility, the basic units of rural residence, known as Autonomous Communities, remained relatively stable. In southeastern Nigeria, these are the obodo or village-groups, numbering from three to thirty villages with a combined population of several tens of thousands (Uzoigwe 2004). The obodo are the basic units of association in terms of personal identity, the answer to the question, "Where are you from?" While the claim of descent from a putative primordial ancestor of the entire community is often fictional and the sense of belonging to a local community and pattern of leadership has evolved considerably during the colonial and postcolonial periods, the roots of these communities precede colonial times (Harneit-Sievers in press:17-20). They were first recognized by the colonial government based on intelligence reports compiled by District Officers in the 1930s (Jones 1988) and were later affirmed by colonial and later national and regional legislations governing traditional rulers and the formation of local governments (Stevens 1953; Harris 1957; Odenigwe 1971; Aborisade 1985). In eastern Nigeria, traditional festivals marking the harvest or the beginning of the farming season are often community-wide events that provide an opportunity for the reaffirmation of a sense of affiliation of individuals, families, and villages with the obodo.

Following a succession of relatively stable military regimes, Nigeria returned to democratic rule in May 1999. The Nigerian economy is heavily dependent on oil revenues and the rural economy is largely stagnant. In the past, the federal government would send some of its oil revenue to the states, who would in turn forward a little of it to LGAs--most of it dissipating along the way. One of the first steps of the democratically elected federal government was to send monthly allocations directly to the elected chair of each LGA. This has changed, and since April 2003 local governments' allocations are deposited into shared accounts

with state governments, which again withhold much of it. However, the amounts allocated to local governments have increased substantially. While in terms of the national budget the amounts are relatively small, in the impoverished rural areas, most Local Governments are dependent on these federal allocations (Ugwu 2000:9-10). As a result, control of local government and its budget has become more advantageous than ever before. Since decisions at the local government level are based on representation by Autonomous Communities, for the first time there is strong pressure on Autonomous Communities to split, thereby multiplying and increasing their vote at the Local Government Council. (1) State governments in eastern Nigeria have approved the splitting of most Autonomous Communities into anywhere between two and ten new Autonomous Communities, each with a recognized traditional ruler. While, by law, new Autonomous Communities should reflect geographic and demographic realities, the power politics that underlie the style of Nigeria democracy often result in those splits reflecting the ability of communities and their leading citizens to gather their resources and gain influence with their state government. The pressure for the splitting of existing communities by creating new Autonomous Communities is done in the name of development and closer local control of resource allocations. However, the splitting is often the result of a desire on the part of economically successful members of the community to convert wealth into a "traditional" source of prestige and local political influence by acquiring titles as "traditional rulers" with their own Autonomous Communities. If, as I have argued, festivals often express and cultivate the tenuous binds that hold communities together, splitting an Autonomous Community puts a tremendous pressure on the communal celebration of the festival by the entire obodo.

Arondizuogu, the largest Aro settlement, was split into eight communities, (2) separating for the first time the descendants of the original Aro settlers from the descendants of their "dependents" who hail from the Anambra area to the north. Although there was a consensus that creating new communities could bring in development, the process of splitting up created some acrimony. As a result, the festival was scaled down for several years and was celebrated more at the village level, with fewer expressions of community-wide celebration. However, Ikeji Arondizuogu enjoys a great regional reputation for its vigorous masquerade performances and attracts visitors from throughout the region. Masquerade is the focus of attention of youth, who are the ones who could overcome those political differences, and after few years, the festival seems to have resumed its grand scale as a celebration of the entire former obodo.

A split in preferred masking genres, however, may begin to appear. The Arondizuogu Ikeji festival is known throughout the region as a bastion of Mmanwu, the masking genre of north central Igboland (Figs. 5-6). This genre was brought in by the "dependents," whose main leader, Iheme, came from Nise in present-day Anambra State. The newly established Autonomous Communities of the dependents (Ndi-Iheme), now champion Mmanwu as representing their own "Anambra identity." Some descendants of the Aro settlers, Ndi-Izuogu, for their part have revived a dormant genre called Nwekpe (Ekpe), (3) which they now advance as an original Aro genre rather than an introduced one (see Fig. 5 left). They have begun to refer to Nwekpe as the true "traditional dance" of the Aro--a claim never made before. This split of masking genres following the partition of the community is only beginning to emerge and it remains to be seen how far it will go.

[FIGURES 5-6]

At Arochukwu, the original Aro center, pressures are mounting to split the community along the historical fissure lines dividing Igbo, Ibibio, and Akpa segments. The two other communities with whom Arochukwu shares their LGA (Ihechiowa and Ututu) have already split into eight Autonomous Communities each. Many people at Arochukwu are convinced that the community does not receive its share of government allocations because they lack appropriate representation at the Local Government Council. Others are concerned about the social and cultural effects of a split. In an article titled "The Autonomous Community Blues" published in the internal Ato publication Aro News, Ndionyenma Nwankwo warns about the consequences of dividing the community and the loss of common identity. "What would happen to those cultural ties that span through different villages of Arochukwu Kingdom?" (Nwankwo 2000:2). His prime example for such ties is the Ikeji festival.

Thanks to Arochukwu's important place in the region's history, the traditional ruler (the Eze Aro) has enjoyed a prominent position in the eyes of both colonial and postcolonial governments (Jones 1956:45; Ijoma 1986). So far, the Eze Aro has successfully resisted this pressure to split and the community is still nominally united. However, tensions around the question of new Autonomous Communities are mounting and the Ikeji festival has become a very contentious time in recent years. While other aspects of the communal celebrations appear to continue, in the last several years several villages have limited their participation in the communal celebration on the culminating day. Many people at Arochukwu are lamenting the fact that Eke Ekpe, the culminating day that used to be a spectacular display of unity through the exhibition of a great variety of masking and dance genres of the various villages, has lost its brilliance. The struggle for control of Arochukwu led to some loss of control of the delicate orchestration of different masquerade genres and dances from different villages, which in turn led to some violent incidents at the peak of the festival. One of the most favorite genres, the Ibibio Ekpo, known for its very virile and aggressive behavior, was even banned for several years (Figs. 6-7). (4) Here again, the acrimony associated with the internal struggle to split the community to gain access to federal financial resources has posed a serious challenge for the celebration of the local festival.

[FIGURE 7 OMITTED]

It appears that although Arondizuogu no longer exists as a unified Autonomous Community while Arochukwu has maintained its formal administrative unity, the impact on the two communities is perhaps the reverse of what might be expected. After a period of tension, Arondizuogu citizens seem to have overcome their differences and the festival continues to be celebrated at the former obodo level. On the other hand, at Arochukwu, the continuous and prolonged struggle between those who favor division and those who attempt to preserve unity has led to the festival's relative decline. It remains to be seen how the changing political and economic conditions in Nigeria will further contribute to the shaping of these rural festivals; however, this sketch should serve as an illustration of the importance of such factors not only for urban art but also to rural and "traditional" artistic production.

The reasons for the recent shift in scholarly interest to contemporary art, which I noted at the beginning of this essay, are not difficult to figure out. The sheer presence, aesthetic quality, and inventiveness of contemporary artistic production in Africa demanded scholarly attention. The move from "area studies" to "global studies" has turned scholarly attention toward artists working with an awareness of the global art world. However, the shift also provided a solution to a growing discomfort about the state of the discipline. By the 1980s, many scholars voiced mounting criticism about the prevailing ahistorical mode of studying African art (Kasfir 1984; Vansina 1984). These critics called for greater historical specificity in the study of African art as the study of change through time. (5)

However, given the nature of historical evidence in sub-Saharan Africa, which is largely derived from oral traditions, attempts to reconstruct the precolonial history of sub-Saharan African art proved a difficult task. My early studies of the Aro Ikeji festival in southeastern Nigeria, in which I attempted a reconstruction of the history of the festival from at least the eighteenth century, attest to this (Bentor 1995). One way of getting at the right kind of documentation was to advance the justifiable claim for the inclusion of all parts of the continent, including North Africa and Egypt, in the study of African art and to use the much more conventional historical evidence available there for such nuanced historical studies. However, this strategy does not provide a method for the study of precolonial history of Sub-Saharan Africa where conventional documentation is largely lacking. The other solution was to focus on the more recent colonial and postcolonial periods, where rich evidence is more readily available. A few of these studies look at rural artistic traditions (Arnoldi 1995; Strother 1997), but the majority focus on urban arts. While this new trend is beginning to yield ex citing results (Ogbechie 2000; Enwezor and Achebe 2001; Roberts, et al. 2003; Harney 2004), I believe that it is time to assess the price that the split into "the traditional" and "the contemporary" has exerted on the discipline.

The terminology describing the two sides of the dichotomy is a thorny issue, and the difficulty of proper terminology points to the inherent problem in such divisions. The usual terms "traditional" and "contemporary" have been often criticized, for good reasons. The phrase "Classical African art" was revived some years ago as a surrogate for the "traditional." Alain Locke used it early on and Margaret Trowell (probably encouraged by William Fagg) used it as the title for her book (Trowell 1970; Roy 1997). In its early use, the phrase was meant largely as a superlative. In general use, the term "classical" evokes a range of notions, from the judgment of quality to the idea of "the typical." However, to art historians the term has a much more precise meaning. It refers to certain qualities associated with specific periods of European art. Susan Vogel advanced an argument in support of associating African art with this more restricted use of the term because, she claims, African art often exhibits similar traits--such the focus on the human figure, moderation, and ideational character--as European "classical" art (Vogel, Carrieri, et al. 1985:xi-xvii). However, this is an over-generalization that may not apply in all contexts. It may better characterize the aesthetic preference of certain collectors, rather than the art of the entire continent. Nevertheless, the term found some currency. In 1999, the Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, advertised two curatorial positions, one for Modern and the other for Classical African art.

The terms used for the other side of the equation are just as troublesome. With a century of what we call "modern art" (Art with a capital A) in Africa for us to study, to classify it all as "contemporary" certainly would not do. In a very real sense, the term "contemporary" is not valid since by the time we can talk about it as Art, it is already in the past. Outside Africa, "modernism" is juxtaposed with the "postmodern." A persuasive argument can be advanced that most recent art in Africa shares more with the Western postmodern than it does with the modern. However, can we have a Postmodern without the Modern?

I have largely opted to use here the terms "rural" and "urban" to emphasize that we are talking about two parallel and interconnected realms linked in time but separated by space. However, even the terms "rural" and "urban" may not work in all situations. Freetown Ode-Lay urban masquerade (Nunley 1987) is a good illustration of the problematic of such a division, as are the gelede gangs terrorizing Lagos drivers today. Conversely, the leading modern artistic movement in Nigeria known as the Nsukka School is based at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in a rural setting. Yet the Nsukka rural environment is clearly manifested in the characteristics of the Nsukka art school and clearly distinguishes it from other artistic centers in Nigeria. For instance, the Yabba College of Technology in Lagos is associated with artists like Ulo Amoda, whose art has much more of an urban characteristic. "Rural" and "urban" should thus be seen as Webberian ideal types. Crossing the more precise chronological terminology of "precolonial," "colonial," and "postcolonial" with the spatial and sociological terms "rural" and "urban" is one way to deal with this dilemma. (6) As I have attempted to demonstrate here, it is as justifiable to look at rural artistic practices in light of their engagement with the larger political and economic context, as it is appropriate to do so with the art produced in the capital city.

I would like to thank the Office of International Programs at Appalachian State University for the generous support that enabled me to carry on research for this paper.

[This article was accepted for publication in October 2005.]

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(1.) Representation is actually by administrative wards that are based on autonomous communities. In addition to maneuvers to increase representation in the existing local government, there is also a strong pressure to split LGAs and bring "democracy closer to the people."

(2.) A long-standing dispute within the family of Izuogu, the Aro founder of Arondizuogu, resulted in an earlier split formalized during a previous period of civilian rule. As a result, Ndiuche was carved out as an autonomous community in 1981.

(3.) Nwekpe (literally son of Ekpe) is a different genre of masking from those used by the Ekpe secret society or the Ibibio Ekpo. See Nicklin and Salmons 1982.

(4.) These observations are preliminary. The impact of the current political situation on the Ikeji of Arochukwu is the topic of my current (2005) research.

(5.) They, however, failed to provide clear examples of how such historical inquiry should proceed given the nature of oral evidence and documentation common in the study of the African past. Vansina's ultimate example of the proper historical study of an African monument is the much more conventionally documented Great Mosque of Qairawan in Tunisia rather than his own studies of the Kuba people. Examples of a more sophisticated historical inquiry in sub-Saharan Africa are largely limited to highly centralized societies where it is more common to find the kind of historical specificity that can shed light on artistic changes as part of larger social, political, demographic, or religious processes of change. Girshick Ben-Amos 1999, while somewhat speculative, offers a nuanced and detailed attempt at historicizing the study of the visual art of an African kingdom during the precolonial period. In noncentralized societies there does not seem to be the same degree of specific historical consciousness that would allow for similar detailed reconstruction of precolonial art history.

(6.) However, this terminology does demand the painful realization that most of what we used to call "traditional African art" is in fact the product of the colonial and postcolonial periods.