Contemporary African Art

March 1, 2000
While respect for modern African art has been slow to develop in the Western world, Kasfir's book is solid evidence that attitudes are changing. Formerly, contemporary African art was seen as a deterioration and degradation of the traditional arts, which had only won grudging admiration in the West under the influence of the modernists. Over the last 15 years, a growing list of books re-evaluating modern African art have appeared, and Kasfir's is among the best and most thorough. Focusing primarily on the period from the 1950s into the 1980s, Kasfir (art history, Emory Univ.) analyzes the political and social dynamics that have shaped the many directions that modern African art have taken. The introduction usefully explores how the subject has been previously handled and explains the author's innovative approach. Accompanying the text are numerous illustrations, satisfactory in quality if sometimes too small or dark to be fully useful. This important milestone in our changing view of world art is highly recommended for any library with art holdings.--Eugene C. Burt, Data Arts, Seattle

Copyright 2000 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2000
YA-Three excellent series titles. Contemporary African Art emphasizes the changes in the art of this continent in the last half of the 20th century. Maya Art examines the reasons behind the artwork and ways the buildings were constructed, incorporating new archaeological findings. They include recent deciphers of Mayan writing that provide understanding to the ceramics, sculpture, architecture, murals, and books. Amazingly, op art and pop art have become almost traditional. With chapters on performance art (Rauschenberg), video, digital, and virtual reality, New Media truly introduces the new wave. The paper in these compact books is of high quality, resulting in outstanding, almost platelike reproduction of the numerous color and black-and-white photos. The illustrations are fully captioned and they alone could justify purchase of these titles.-Claudia Moore, W. T. Woodson High School, Fairfax, VA

Copyright 2000 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.