LACMA’s Zaire Art Exhibition a Brotherly Act

Twenty-two years after Lee and Bob Bronson bought their first piece of African art and 16 years after their massive collection made its public debut in a coffee-table book and traveling exhibition, Lee Bronson decided it was time for some of the artworks to venture out into the world again.

A graduate of Fairfax High School who had worked at the landmark May Co. department store on Wilshire Boulevard before he and his brother founded a highly successful sportswear company, Bronson of California, he did what came naturally--picked up the phone and called his neighborhood culture palace, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

The museum has few examples of African art and no resident expert on the subject, so Bronson was referred to Nancy Thomas, curator of ancient and Islamic art, who immediately invited him to visit. With what she views as perfect timing, he arrived one day last November when the museum was teeming with African American students but had only three pieces of African art on display.

That did it. Bronson had found an audience for the artwork he wanted to share. Within a couple of months, he and his brother had donated 37 African artworks to the museum. And now 19 of those gifts plus 27 loans are on display in an exhibition, “Selections From the Bronson Collection of Art From Zaire,” in the atrium gallery of the Ahmanson building.

An energetic aficionado of African art who lights up when he talks about his collection, Lee Bronson says he couldn’t be happier with the installation at LACMA, designed by Bernard Kester in consultation with Virginia Fields, associate curator of pre-Columbian, ancient and Islamic art. He’s also pleased with labels that explain the origin and roles of the objects, written by Ramona Austin, a Zaire specialist who is the Dallas Museum of Art’s associate curator of African art.

Strolling through the show of sculptural figures, furniture, pendants, masks and ceremonial objects, Bronson points out his hands-down favorite piece, an intricately carved ivory scepter that was part of a Yombe chief’s regalia. “Nothing is left out of this carving,” he says, comparing the rudimentary hands and feet of other sculptures with the detailed anatomy of figures portrayed on the scepter.

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Moving on to a gallery of masks, he calls attention to differences between artworks of the Yaka, Kuba, Mbagani and Tshwa cultures. “Every tribe has its signature face,” he says.

The Bronson brothers, who have closed their business and retired, became interested in African art in the early 1970s when they frequently traveled to Europe. The more they looked and learned about the subject, the more they realized that they were almost invariably drawn to artworks from Zaire. Although it’s a large and culturally diverse country, extending more than 1,000 miles east from the Atlantic Ocean, the Bronsons found that the region’s best art shared a consistently high quality of carving.

“Once smitten, African art got me crazy,” Lee Bronson says. “It seemed more real to me than other forms of art. Unlike contemporary art, which has many faces (depending on viewers’ interpretations and experiences), African art has one face.”

That doesn’t mean it was a quick study, he says. The brothers spent countless hours educating themselves at museums and galleries, primarily in Belgium, as they refined their taste. But they also bought voraciously, acquiring about 1,500 pieces from 1972 to 1985. Since then, they have added only a few pieces each year. But Lee Bronson says his affiliation with LACMA has rekindled his interest and given it a new dimension.

“African art has done more for me than I have done for it,” he says. “It has opened doors and given me the joy of displaying it.” Now he’s eager to build an audience for African art and encourage other gifts to LACMA. “This is like a matching grant,” he says of his donation. “If we give 37 pieces, maybe someone else will give 37 pieces.”

Thomas hopes that LACMA will eventually have a permanent installation of African art. But the immediate goal, she says, is to “get a lot of mileage out of the exhibition in terms of audience and exposure.”

* “Selections From the Bronson Collection of Art From Zaire,” Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., (213) 857-6000. Hours: Tues.-Thurs., 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Fri., 10 a.m.-9 p.m.; Sat.-Sun., 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Admission: adults $6, students and seniors $4, children and teen-agers 6-17 $1, children under 5 free. Admission is free to all the second Wednesday of each month. Through Oct. 29.