Art and Oracle
Art and Oracle

Author: Alisa LaGamma

Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 82

ISBN-13: 0870999338

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Twenty-eight African cultures are represented here by artifacts created to communicate with ancestors, spirits, and gods, about such issues as health, conception, and determination of guilt or innocence. Issued in conjunction with an April-July 2000 exhibit at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, this catalog contains extensive ethnographic, descriptive, and interpretive text in connection with each of 50 pictured pieces, as well as a 13-page essay about divination in Sub-Saharan Africa (by John Pemberton III) and an introductory essay by LaGamma. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Picasso's Collection of African & Oceanic Art
Picasso's Collection of African & Oceanic Art

Author: Peter Stepan

Publisher: Prestel Publishing

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 160

ISBN-13:

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Although he never set foot in Africa, Picasso had a passion for African art. Throughout the course of his life, he assembled a unique collection of statues and masks. Comprising more than 120 objects, Picasso's private collection can now be found in museums in Paris such as the Louvre, Musee Quai Branly and the Musee Picasso, as well as in the private collections of members of Picasso's family. This beautiful book documents the entire collection and examines it as a whole. It features documentary photographs, a section of stunning colour plates, and detailed ethnographic descriptions of each piece, providing a full account of Picasso's relationship with African and Oceanic art. This important publication sheds new light on the fascination non-Western art held for one of twentieth century's most important artists. Review: '...an illuminating and handsome book, copiously illustrated with fascinating original documents and excellent colour reproductions...''... a convenient and also essential reference tool for anyone interested in this important subject.''... an invaluable and also entertaining guide.''... this book not only investigates Picasso's response to tribal art with unusual thoroughness, but also reopens the larger question of the artist's 'primitivism'.'The Burlington Magazine, June 2007

Activating the Past
Activating the Past

Author: Andrew Apter

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Published: 2009-12-14

Total Pages: 470

ISBN-13: 1443817902

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Activating the Past explores critical historical events and transformations associated with embodied memories in the Black Atlantic world. The assembled case-studies disclose hidden historical references to local and regional encounters with Atlantic modernity, focusing on religious festivals that represent political and economic relationships in “fetishized” forms of power and value. Although memories of the slave trade are rarely acknowledged in West Africa and the Americas, they have retreated, so to speak, within ritual associations as restricted, repressed, even secret histories that are activated during public festivals and through different styles of spirit possession. In West Africa, our focus on selected port cities along the coast extends into the hinterlands, where slave raiding occurred but is poorly documented and rarely acknowledged. In the Caribbean, regional contrasts between coastal and hinterland communities relate figures of the jíbaro, the indio and the caboclo to their ritual representations in Santería, Vodou, and Candomblé. Highlighting the spatial association of memories with shrines and the ritual “condensation” of regional geographies, we locate local spirits and domestic terrains within co-extensive Atlantic horizons. The volume brings together leading scholars of the African Diaspora who not only explore these ritual archives for significant echoes of the past, but also illuminate a subaltern historiography embedded within Atlantic cultural systems.

African Art and Artefacts in European Collections
African Art and Artefacts in European Collections

Author: Ezio Bassani

Publisher: British Museum Press

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 374

ISBN-13:

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This life work of Ezio Bassani provides a unique record of over 800 artefacts in more than 100 early (pre-19th century) African collections in Europe. Extensively illustrated, the catalogue gives full descriptions of each artefact and the details of every collection, with present location and provenance provided where known. Documentation relating to the collections is given in its original language with a translation and commentary in English and there are full indexes, including categories of artefact by material used. Fully cross-referenced, it can be used in both print and electronic formats for maximum accessibility across a wide range of research interests.

Selected Works from the Collection of the National Museum of African Art
Selected Works from the Collection of the National Museum of African Art

Author: National Museum of African Art (U.S.)

Publisher: University of Washington Press

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13:

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The National Museum of African Art began as a private educational institution in 1964 and became part of the Smithsonian Institution in 1979. This volume includes highlights from the museum's holdings of traditional African art from throughout the continent, although the majority of works originated in sub-Saharan Africa. The 150 objects presented include sculpted masks and figures, regalia, items of personal adornment, textiles, furniture, and household objects. Each entry provides a discussion about the object's meaning and use and includes provenance and publication history. Fully illustrated in color, the handbook also includes maps, an extensive bibliography, and an introduction by Roy Sieber, America's foremost authority on traditional African art.

The Visual Arts of Africa
The Visual Arts of Africa

Author: Judith Perani

Publisher: Pearson

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 416

ISBN-13:

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Special features of this book: follows a geographical organization across the continent; each chapter is reader friendly with clear, accessible sub-headings; represents important religious and utilitarian art traditions from the Sahara desert, West Africa, Central Africa, Northeast Africa, Eastern Africa, and Southern Africa; gives special attention to the themes of gender, power, and life cycle rituals, which frequently intersect with one another to form an understanding of the arts of Africa; includes figurative sculpture, masquerades, architecture, textiles, dress, ceramics, wall painting, and leatherwork traditions; includes selected examples of the earliest known documented art works as well as contemporary art of each geographical region; includes an up-to-date bibliography, incorporating recent published field research for each chapter; and features 369 black and white illustrations, 16 colored plates, maps, and a time line.