The African Studies Program (ASP), an International Programs affinity group, helps students gain a broader understanding of African history and contemporary life in Africa and provides an environment of cooperation and collaboration among students and faculty that leads to increased opportunities for research and teaching. The new director of ASP is Cory Gundlach, curator of African art at the Stanley Museum of Art. He shares with us his thoughts about the direction of ASP moving forward, and how the African art collection at the Stanley Museum plays into this vision.

Can you tell us about your current role at the University of Iowa and what drew you to the director position of the African Studies Program?

I currently work as curator of African art at the Stanley Museum of Art, where I have been since 2012, and was appointed full-time in 2015. My primary responsibility is to curate exhibitions that focus on the museum’s African collection, and The Stanley Collection of African Art in particular, a world-renowned art collection that Max and Betty Stanley gifted to the university between 1979 and 1990 as a resource for teaching and learning. My curatorial work typically involves conceiving of new ideas for exhibitions, securing support for them, thorough research on every object included in each exhibition, the development of an interpretation plan and written didactics, collaborative public programs, and leading exhibition tours for students and the public.

With a $400,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, last year I began leading a team of three assistants for provenance research on the African collection. Part of that research led to my recent restitution, with Mellon Curatorial Fellow Peju Layiwola, of two objects formerly in the Stanley Museum’s permanent collection stolen by British colonial agents during the siege of 1897, at the Oba’s Palace in Benin City, Nigeria.

As of this year, I also teach part-time for Iowa’s Museum Studies Program. This spring I offered a course in collaboration with Indiana University on curating African art in America. I plan to offer the course again next fall (2025) for students enrolled at Iowa.

Directing Iowa’s African Studies Program provides an opportunity for me to lead discussions and activities with about 20 faculty members across Iowa’s campus that are actively involved in teaching and research on or about the continent. It is a group that has the power and privilege to shape what African studies is at Iowa, and as a curator of African art, I see the African collection at the Stanley Museum as one of Iowa’s most valuable resources for teaching and research for members (and their students) of this affinity group. I made this latter point clear in our first meeting at the museum this fall, and the fact that you do not need to be a historian of African art to use the African collection to teach. The African collection is here for ASP members to think about Africa across the disciplines, regardless of whether it is called art, artifact, expressive/material culture, cultural heritage, and so on.

What direction will you be taking the program?  

I’d like to increase the involvement of students and student organizations in ASP, host ASP-related events at the Stanley Museum of Art, and increase faculty, student, and public engagement with the African collection, exhibitions, and visiting scholars and artists from the continent.

The restitution of artifacts to the Kingdom of Benin by the University of Iowa's Stanley Museum of Art was notable in that it was the first museum in the United States to do so. Does your experience with the restitution influence how you will run the African Studies Program?

It does. From a global perspective, it shows me how the practical value of rigorous research in the humanities, and provenance research in this case, has the power to positively change Iowa’s relationship with the Benin Kingdom and Africa more broadly. In fact, historical objects from the Benin Kingdom, such as ivory masks, are commonly used in popular culture and the media to represent the entire continent. In addition to being the first museum in North America to do what the Stanley Museum of Art did with restitution, the University of Iowa now has a relationship with the Court of Benin and the Oba that was not there before, and it is one that was built upon trust and respect. I look forward to other ways I can align my curatorial work with my goal as director of ASP, which is to create new relationships with colleagues on the continent and to strengthen those we already have. I am very thankful for the work that International Programs Associate Provost and Dean Russ Ganim is doing to support this initiative through his recent trips to Senegal, Nigeria, and South Africa.

On a more local level, I also see my ASP directorship as an opportunity to continue a legacy of innovation in African studies that began here in 1957, when Roy Sieber earned America’s first PhD in African art history. My restitution work in Nigeria is innovative because it is unprecedented, and this is because it was driven by provenance research on the African collection at Iowa that has never been done before. Provenance research is an excellent example of the human-centered value of object-oriented analysis. The work always begins with a museum object, but the goal is to confirm its ethical status with evidence that shows how, why, when, where, and with whom it traveled from Africa to Iowa, in this case. I have also been involved with similar museum projects in California and Colorado, where I was directly involved in the return of historic objects and human remains to representatives of the Wiyot Tribe and Cree Nation. Collectively, these experiences have shown me the power of ethics-driven research, which is something I look forward to exploring further with faculty in the African Studies Program at Iowa.

International Programs (IP) at the University of Iowa (UI) is committed to enriching the global experience of UI students, faculty, staff, and the general public by leading efforts to promote internationally oriented teaching, research, creative work, and community engagement.  IP provides support for international students and scholars, administers scholarships and assistance for students who study, intern, or do research abroad, and provides funding opportunities and grant-writing assistance for faculty engaged in international research. IP shares their stories through various media, and by hosting multiple public engagement activities each year.