Text of the first William Fagg Memorial Lecture, a series founded to commemorate the African interests of the BM's Keeper of Ethnography between 1969 and 1974. The title refers to a Yoruba proverb that suggests that we look beyond what is easily observed if we are to understand something. Only if art is placed in an African intellectual context, argues the speaker, can we hope to fully appreciate it. A modern reflection on the `social life of things' which will be of interest to many theoreticians.