Spirits in the African Night Going through the gateway of the exhibition aptly called "In The Presence of Spirits" is like entering another world, an immersion into a teeming, vibrant section of the African continent. Yet this large, diverse, rich exhibition at the National Museum of African Art is something else, too. For all the strangeness and uniqueness of the objects on display and the cultures encountered, it has surprising echoes of the familiar. The exhibit consists of a large group of some 1,240 objects, some dating as far back as 1850, from the National Museum of Ethnology in Lisbon, Portugal. These particular objects from that particular institution have never been seen before in the United States. Some of the notable pieces include huge masks worn like headdresses with shark faces and the bones of bulls, spirit emblems that serve as altar pieces. There are also staffs and pots and pans ornately carved, helmets and masks representing long departed but still vivid ancestors, the gear of chiefs and medicine men, funeral headstones, and a large collection of stunning dolls. Many of the objects in this exhibition have undeniable power, and enthralling beauty, not to mention an otherworldly air. Yet however exotic, po werful and eerie the objects might be, theyíre also resonant of universal spirits. Itís a quality that makes this exhibition so affecting: the familiar, moving like still another spirit to animate and heighten the already vivid objects on display. óGary Tischler