Architectural Artifacts

Somewhere a house came down, and its doors, posts and ceilings went on. Antique architectural elements arrive from Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Europe. Elm doors and coffered ceiling panels from China, carved teak and sandstone from India, Newari woodwork from Nepal, painted Tibetan doors, cedar ceilings and mihrab-form niches from Morocco. Toraja panels from tongkonan ancestral houses in Sulawesi, Majapahit terra cotta from Java, British colonial shutters, stained glass from Europe and its outposts. In Africa: Gurage kata or sleepwalker posts from Ethiopia, Nupe and Yoruba veranda posts from Nigeria, Dogon granary doors, Bongo grave posts from Sudan, protective as well as load-bearing.

Most date from the eighteenth to the early twentieth century. Elm, teak, marble and soapstone keep their tool marks and weathering. A house post in a stairwell, a ceiling panel above a dining table, a pair of shutters against a concrete wall. Architecture, with a past life.