A dialogue with Africa
What could possibly connect a Bambara door from Mali, a Dogon granary, a Lobi stool from Burkina Faso, and Hermann Becker’s steel furniture? At first glance, nothing. The materials differ, as do the techniques. On the one hand, wood shaped through ancestral craftsmanship with ritual significance; on the other, steel, concrete, felt, and industrial processes. Yet in 2000, the exhibition Die afrikanische Skulptur im Dialog mit den Möbeln von Hermann Becker brought them face to face. Presented alongside one another, these objects seem to share a common language.
Through his interest in the cultures of Mali, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Togo, and Côte d’Ivoire, Hermann Becker discovered a way of conceiving furniture in which function is never reduced to mere utility. Each object plays a role in organizing daily life, accompanies rituals, structures social relationships, or preserves collective memory. Rather than drawing from these traditions a repertoire of forms, Hermann Becker recognized in them a universal way of conceiving objects, where function, the body, and use are inseparable.
This vision is reflected in the Stellschirm, a steel and concrete screen whose juxtaposition with a Bambara door from Mali reveals a shared reflection on the notion of the threshold. Beyond their differences in material and context, both mark a point of passage and organize the transition between two spaces.
The same principle guides the seating pieces. The Hocker mit Rohr enters into dialogue with a Lobi stool from Burkina Faso, while the Museumsbank zweiteilig is presented alongside a Bamileke stool from Cameroon. None of these objects seeks ostentatious comfort. Instead, all privilege a direct relationship between the body and the material.
The Sitzbank Mille Pattes, exhibited alongside a Tsogho ritual bench from Gabon, demonstrates how the same typology can transcend cultures. Despite their very different constructions, both benches are conceived to accommodate several people. Hermann Becker regarded this piece as a true stylistic challenge. The repetition of its legs, recalling the posts of the toguna, the traditional meeting houses of Mali, transforms the base itself into a genuine compositional element.
Present on many of his seating pieces, felt also occupies an essential place in Becker’s work. Used as a tribute to Joseph Beuys, it introduces a distinctive dimension into his austere structures. Where steel expresses the rigor of construction, felt evokes warmth, protection, and comfort. In doing so, the designer embraces the symbolic significance that Beuys associated with the material, creating a contrast between the apparent coldness of metal and the softness of the seat.
Another intention is expressed through the very act of sitting. Hermann Becker sought to have Europeans sit at the same height as Africans. By deliberately lowering his stools and benches, he encourages a posture in which the knees naturally sit higher than the hips. The Runder Beistelltisch (1989), shown alongside a Nupe stool from Nigeria, extends this idea. Despite their different functions, both are based on the same construction principle: a circular top supported by several legs arranged around its perimeter.
The Regalinstallation mit Leiter is presented in comparison with a Dogon granary from Mali. Both are organized around a ladder that provides access to what is meant to be preserved. In Dogon architecture, the ladder leads to grain stores but also to a space where knowledge is transmitted and community discussions take place. In Hermann Becker’s work, books replace the harvest. The bookcase therefore ceases to be a simple storage unit and becomes an architecture of memory, where knowledge is accumulated and passed on.
How can objects separated by centuries and continents appear so closely related? Perhaps because they respond to the same fundamental needs: to cross a threshold, to sit, to preserve, or to share. The dialogue Hermann Becker establishes with African art is therefore not a story of influence, but a story of shared human needs.
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