Model Canoe and Paddles (1900s): Art, History and Details

Model Canoe and Paddles (1900s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Made of plain wood, this is a model of a canoe with a prow, seats, and five paddles. Composed of multiple panels sewn together with fibers, it was described in historical museum documents as a "war canoe." Similar examples from around the same period are found in American and European museums, where they had been collected in eastern, central, and western Africa as anthropological artifacts rather than as artworks. While the archives have little information about this object, it appears similar to Ugandan sewn plank canoes and to a model example collected in Uganda between 1890 and 1910 now at the British Museum.

Object facts

• Title: Model Canoe and Paddles
• Date: 1900s
• Culture: Africa, East Africa, probably Uganda, unknown maker
• Type: Furniture and woodwork
• Technique: wood
• Dimensions: Overall: 12.8 cm (5 1/16 in.)
• Collection: African Art
• Department: African Art
• Accession number: 1929.350

A detail from the museum

The small scale and a 1929 description of this object as "modern" suggest it was made for tourists.

Collection credit

Gift of the African Art Sponsors of Karamu House

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.