Product Description

A History of Art in Africa, Second Edition, is the only comprehensive art historical survey of the African continent to incorporate discussions of contemporary art and artists.  It is both a reliable resource for art historians and an accessible introduction to the vibrant arts of Africa.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #585228 in Books
• Published on: 2007-07-13
• Released on: 2007-10-09
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: 5.14 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 560 pages

From Amazon.co.uk
A History of Art in Africa is part of Thames & Hudson's distinguished list of books on African Art, which includes Jean-Baptiste Bacquart's The Tribal Arts of Africa and Frank Willett's African Art. However, A History of Art in Africa, with its contributions from some of the most distinguished American art historians working on the subject, is probably the most comprehensive and standard book currently available for the general reader on African Art. Lavishly illustrated with 700 illustrations, 120 in colour, what raises this book above the many others on the subject is its comprehensive range and the quality of its writing. The book quite rightly rejects what it sees as "an inaccurate sense of Africa as a place of monolithic artistic practice", and places its stress on regional innovations, whilst also remaining aware of "the broader cross-cultural traits that link them". As a result the book is broken down into five discrete sections--"From the Nile to the Niger", "Western Africa", "Central Africa", "Eastern and Southern Africa", and a final, particularly commendable section "The Diaspora", dealing primarily with art in the context of slavery and displacement. The sections are then broken down into smaller chapters written chronologically, allowing interesting comparisons in the section on West Africa between, for instance, Akan and Yoruba art. Ranging from the prehistoric to the postmodern in African Art, the book also has a refreshing focus on "architecture and everyday life", avoiding the usual pitfalls of ethnographic approaches, whilst retaining a sense of the complex cultural differences that motivate so much of the extraordinary art reproduced in this excellent book. --Jerry Brotton

About the Author

MONICA BLACKMUN VISONA is Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of Kentucky. Her publications focuses upon the arts of the Lagoon Peoples and upon the larger issues of contemporary African art.

ROBIN POYNOR is Professor of Art History at the University of Florida. He is a specialist on Yoruba arts in Africa and the New World and is a regular contributor to African Arts.  He has served as both consultant and guest curator for numerous exhibitions.

HERBERT M. COLE is Professor Emeritus of Art History at the University of California, Santa Barbara and a recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Arts Council of the African Studies Association. He has published numerous books and exhibition catalogues.

The closing chapter of this book was written by Michael Harris, Associate Professor of African American Studies at Emory University.  The preface was written by Roland Abiodun, Professor of Art Hisotry at Amherst College, and the introduction was written by Suzanne Preston Blier, Allen Whitehill Clowes Professor of Fine Art and Africam American Studies at Harvard University.