Africa In The Unesco Art Collection

The Toledo Museum of Art has a small but choice collection of the art of sub-Saharan Africa. Collecting began in 1958 with a Benin Queen Mother head and a Fang mask that once belonged to artist Maurice Vlaminck. This book combines up-to-date scholarship with field photographs and selections from African literature. We hope readers will enjoy the process of turning toward, confronting, and connectingwith the art and people of Africa. Notes; Index.

National Museums in Africa brings the voices of African museum professionals into dialogue with scholars and, by so doing, is able to consider the state of African national museums from fresh perspectives. Covering all regions of the continent, the volume’s thirteen chapters allow for a deep and nuanced understanding of the intricate interplay between past and present in contemporary Africa. Taking stock of the shifting museum landscape in Africa, with new players like China and South Korea challenging the conditions of cultural exchange, the book demonstrates that national museums are being rediscovered as important sites of political engagement and cultural negotiation. This is the first book to critically examine the roles national museums in Africa have played in the societies in which they are situated, but it is also the first to consider the roles that national museums might play in current debates concerning the restitution and repatriation of cultural patrimony taken from Africa during the colonial era. Informed by a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective, this ground-breaking book will appeal to anyone interested in museums in Africa. It will be particularly useful to scholars and students working in the areas of museum and heritage studies, African studies, anthropology, archaeology, history, art history and cultural studies.

African Art invites you to explore the dynamic origins of the vast artistic expressions arising from the exotic and mystifying African continent. Since the discovery of African art at the end of the nineteenth century during the colonial expositions it has been a limitless source of inspiration for artists who, over time, have perpetually recreated these artworks. The power of Sub-Saharan African art lies within its visual diversity, demonstrating the creativity of the artists who are continuing to conceptualize new stylistic forms. From Mauritania to South Africa and from the Ivory Coast to Somalia, statues, masks, jewelry, pottery and tapestries compose a variety of daily and ritual objects springing from these richly varied societies.

An exhibition organised by the Whitechapel Art Gallery, London as part of africa95, a season celebrating the arts of Africa taking place in Britain from August to December 1995. Concept and General Editor: Clementine Deliss.