90.7 WMFE

A Bronze Kingdom lies not too far from Orlando’s International airport. This African art gallery and museum opened earlier this year and showcases bronze artwork brought from Africa. Some pieces are said to date back to the early 1600s.

Curator Philip Ringler said most of the pieces are from West Africa and were made using the lost wax method.

“This is a method where you’re using bees wax to carve the initial sculpture and then that’s molded into a ceramic mold, and then the molten metal, which is a copper alloy, is poured into the mold and the wax melts off, so that’s why it’s called lost wax, because the wax itself burns up,” said Ringler.

The museum is the culmination of work by collector Mr. Rawlvan R. Bennett over 30 years. Bennett cultivated relationships with African leaders and got many of these pieces in exchange for helping communities build infrastructure. The pieces come from Nigeria, Cameroon, Ghana, and Senegal, among other places.

Listen to the audio player above for more about the museum. And click the audio below to hear about these art pieces:

Secret Society. Photo by Crystal Chavez

Devine Feminine. Photo by Crystal Chavez.