Angolan exhibition at Powell-Cotton Museum

A unique project looking to display artifacts, film and old images taken by famous explorer Powell-Cotton’s daughters alongside contemporary Angolan pictures has won funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Dramatic images captured in 1930s Angola by the daughters of Victorian explorer Major Powell-Cotton are to be rediscovered as part of a unique cultural exhibition.

Rare film footage, photographs and artifacts will be displayed alongside contemporary images taken by Angolan photographer Joaquim Fortunato, who is returning to the exact locations visited by the two women.

The exhibition, which will be displayed from next April at the Powell-Cotton Museum at Quex Park in Birchington, was made possible through funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

It also attracted the interest of the Angolan Cultural Attaché Antonio Sampaio who paid a visit to the museum last week to see some of the 3,000 artifacts, film and images collected by Antoinette and Diana Powell-Cotton more than 80 years ago.

Co-curator of the exhibition, Catherine Moore, said the Attaché was “overwhelmed” by what he saw.

“It was very touching. These are mostly pictures of younger people and, for example, a woman who was pregnant, which makes you wonder what happened to that baby and where that person is now.”

Ms Moore said the project’s aim was to reach out to the Angolan community in the UK while also teaching British people more about Africa.

“Angolan people worry that people in the UK perceive a country of Africa, such as Angola, as very rural and deprived compared to places in Europe,” she said.

“Since peacetime in Angola there has been large development and progression.

“Powell-Cotton was aware of the changes that were coming, which was the reason for his daughters’ visit.

“The aim now is to revisit some of the places, showing the development but also the same culture that was there before.”

Ms Moore, who has lived in Namibia, said she was particularly taken in by the work of the Powell-Cotton sisters, who were 28 and 23 at the time of their exploratory visit to an area little visited by English speaking researchers during the 1930s.

“They showed a side of life in Angola that hadn’t been represented by male explorers,” she said.

“They were two young women with marvellous spirit who went against the advice of the Foreign Office and just got on with it.

“The film footage they took was from a very female perspective. It showed domestic scenes and home life which hadn’t really been seen before. It wasn’t just about classifying and collecting or measuring; it was about a connection and showing real life.

“To have film from that time is very special. I think this project will show the ongoing culture, which is what the sisters would have wanted.”

The Powell-Cotton women collected more than 3,000 cultural objects, took more than 3,000 photographs and recorded four hours of black and white, silent film.

Funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund will allow for the findings to be redisplayed alongside pictures taken by Joaquim Fortunato, who will return to the places visited to show how they look today with the support of the Angolan Embassy.

Ms Moore added: “This is beyond the type of response we were hoping for, yet goes to the heart of our objective of making these collections meaningful in a contemporary way.”

The Powell-Cotton Museum in Quex House has nine galleries devoted to the life’s work of famous explorer, collector and conservationist Major Percy Horace Gordon Powell-Cotton.

The museum holds the world’s largest collection of endangered and extinct African and Asian animals’ DNA that are used internationally for research and conservation projects.