1. Second to the Gods: Royal Regalia of the Yoruba
2. Improving the Bowtie: African-American Improvisational Quilts

Over the past two years or so, the Mills College Art Gallery has become one of the most interesting venues in the East Bay. A combination of historical and contemporary exhibitions rotates at sometimes dizzying speeds (some shows are only up for two weeks). The transformation of the exhibition program from OK to pretty spectacular is clearly related to the presence of a new director. At present, aside from the three shows reviewed here, there is also a group of pieces by Bay Area neo-conceptualist Gay Outlaw, videos by Mona Hatoum and Linda Montano, and a gallery hung with works drawn from the museum's collection of about 6000 objects. Oh, and a twenty-foot metal shipping container just outside the building covered with the murals of Oakland artist Keba Konte in honor of his mother. (When I asked about this last piece, the young woman sitting at the front desk looked at me blankly and said "what container?" I took her to the door and pointed at it. She then told me it was probably just something for the students to paint on. Fortunately, the true identity of this piece was on the school's website.)

Yoruba beadwork filled the front gallery—mostly crowns and coronets, made during the last hundred and twenty years or so. Dr. William K. Ehrenfeld recently gave the college almost 800 works, and this is the first of three small shows consisting of works selected from that gift. The center of the room featured rows of this astonishing headgear, each one mounted on a simple cloth pedestal. Three-dimensional birds, faces in relief and geometric patterns adorned these fez-like forms made from leather and covered entirely in glass and sometimes stone beads. The symbolic meanings attached to the bead's palette of mostly primary colors are apparently linked to specific temperaments, among other things. There were also beaded staffs, a set of what looked like vestments, and even two chairs/ thrones encrusted with glistening patterns. It goes without saying that these pieces have profound religious and social significance. But I still allowed myself a few guilt-free moments to just stare at them in open-mouthed admiration, as amazing, enchanting products of ingenuity and artistry.

In the other large exhibition area of the gallery, quilts made by African-American women during the last thirty-five years hung on the walls. These works' lively, organic compositions show what can be done with the traditional "bowtie" pattern when it's being explored by quilt-makers steeped in a tradition of improvisation. These quilts are such satisfying, deeply attractive works of art that it's difficult to imagine them being rejected as "filled with mistakes"—an attitude apparently held by some of the Euro-American quiltmakers who came in contact with similarly crafted objects. It's ironic, when we compare this with widely-held attitudes towards improvisation in music—specifically, jazz. But putting aural and visual artforms side by side is really an apples-and-oranges kind of activity. It's better to just feel grateful that Eli Leon has collected and preserved the marvelous quilts in this show.

It goes without saying that these pieces have profound religious and social significance. But I still allowed myself a few guilt-free moments to just stare at them in open-mouthed admiration, as amazing, enchanting products of ingenuity and artistry.