The Royal Arts of Africa

The Royal Arts of Africa
Author: Suzanne P. Blier
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Total Pages: 272
Release: 1998-01
Genre: Africa, Sub-Saharan
ISBN: 9780134402079

For use in an undergraduate or graduate course in African Art; also suitable as a supplementary reading for art history surveys. Lavishly illustrated, this historically grounded text draws together key traditions from West, Central, Eastern and Southern Africa to present an informative and captivating survey of the most important royal arts in the great sub-Saharan African kingdoms. Exploring the diverse ways that African rulers employed art and architecture to define individual and state identity, it provides an overview of the major themes in royal African art and discusses what these arts reveal about the nature of kingship.

Bamum

Bamum
Author: Christraud Geary
Publisher: 5Continents
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011-09-01
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9788874395736

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, artists working for the royal court of Bamum, in Cameroon, created elaborate bead-covered thrones and stools, wooden sculptures, masks in human and animal form, architectural carvings, and fine objects in bronze, ivory, and clay. This book focuses on the history, iconography, and meaning of these royal arts and looks at Western collectors who were fascinated by King Ibrahim Njoya (ruled 1886/7 to 1931) and the splendor of the royal court. Visual and written sources--including testimony by King Njoya and his courtiers, and extensive archival records--cast light on the strategies of a monarch who allowed visitors to acquire these arts to enhance the kingdom's reputation in distant Europe. The history of Bamum arts thus offers unique perspectives on African creativity and ingenuity, and European ways of collecting.

Royal Art of Benin

Royal Art of Benin
Author: Kate Ezra
Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art
Total Pages: 346
Release: 1992
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0870996339

Tantalizing trivia. this Hitler, spoiling everything?"

The Art of the Bambui Kingdom (Western Grassfields, Cameroon)

The Art of the Bambui Kingdom (Western Grassfields, Cameroon)
Author: Mathias Fubah Alubafi
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 130
Release: 2014-03-26
Genre: Music
ISBN: 1443858803

Written as part of the Bambui Museum and Ecotourism Project (BMEP), this stunningly illustrated book introduces readers to the history of the Bambui fondom in the western Grassfields of Cameroon, and presents an exhaustive interpretation of the artistic and cultural heritage of the fondom. Initially conceived as part of an initiative launched in 2001 by Centro Orientamento Educativo, an Italian NGO, aimed at creating museums in some palaces of the Cameroon Grassfields, the book serves as a pilot endeavour towards addressing problems associated with antiques and other cultural assets such as theft and the illegal traffic of objects, the exploitation of poor fondoms by African art dealers and researchers from the West, and the lack of education about the different ways and means the fondoms could employ to transform these resources to the benefit of all. For anyone aspiring to learn about the rich and diverse art of Bambui, in particular, and the western Grassfields as a whole, this book will prove useful, especially since it is written by someone who has lived, and is still living, the Bambui experience.

Culture and Customs of Cameroon

Culture and Customs of Cameroon
Author: John Mukum Mbaku Esq.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2005-06-30
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0313027366

Cameroon, in Central Africa, has been called Africa in miniature. It is characterized by exceptional social and ethnic diversity, with more than 250 ethnicities now forming five major regional-culture groupings. This volume is the first to encapsulate Cameroon's rich indigenous and modern customs and traditions in depth. The narrative emphasizes those aspects that define its modern nation, its peoples, the unique societies, their institutions, and various lifestyles. The origins of Cameroon's diverse culture are traced back to the various ethnic groups and languages as well as the influence of European colonialism, Christianity, Islam, and other external factors, including globalization. In each topical chapter, examples from ethnic groups are presented to give some sense of the variety of experiences. Cameroon has had a turbulent and eventful modern history with German, English, and French incursions, and students and general readers will be able to understand the current struggle for democracy post independence. The history colors the substantial coverage of the many topics examined, from education, to marriage and women's roles, sports, and holidays, daily life, the arts, and much more. This volume will stand as the definitive, accessible introduction to Cameroon and will be essential for building a well-rounded Africa collection.

Bambui Arts and Culture

Bambui Arts and Culture
Author: Mathias Fubah Alubafi
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 141
Release: 2018-11-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1527521648

This book focuses on the traditional arts and culture of Bambui, a kingdom in the western Grassfields of Cameroon. Although a small kingdom in comparison to much bigger kingdoms such as Mankon, Banso, Kom and Bali, the arts and culture of this kingdom have served, and continue to serve, as a way of life, as ritual, as decoration, and as a means of uniting with the sublime since pre-colonial times. However, in presenting the arts and culture of the western Grassfields, scholars have given much attention only to the dominant kingdoms. As such, Bambui, and many other smaller kingdoms have been rendered voiceless. This text brings forth the voice of one of the smallest kingdoms in the western Grassfields through the presentation of its historical arts, and culture, and the changes that have taken, and continue to take place, in the society. It represents primarily an examination of the socio-cultural organisation of the kingdom and the various kinds of art that are used within the different contexts. These milestones are well-illustrated with historical and contemporary images.

Contesting Art

Contesting Art
Author: Jeremy MacClancy
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2020-08-27
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1000323854

Art is a major political weapon of our times. Today, peoples around the world use art to boost their own identity and to attack the ways others represent them. At a time of increasing intercultural exchange, art has become a primary means through which groups reinforce their challenged sense of culture.This pioneering book breaks with the tradition of the anthropology of art as the depoliticized study of aesthetics in exotic settings. Transcending artificial distinctions between the West and the Rest, it examines the increasingly significant relations among art, identity and politics in the modern world.Among the themes investigated by the contributors: - how African painters undermine racist stereotypes yet remain dominated by the Western art market - the role of anthropology museums in the perpetuation of the Western market in 'tribal art' - the internal and external political disputes underlying the 'repatriation' of cultural property.

The Intestines of the State

The Intestines of the State
Author: Nicolas Argenti
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 387
Release: 2008-09-15
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0226026132

The young people of the Cameroon Grassfields have been subject to a long history of violence and political marginalization. For centuries the main victims of the slave trade, they became prime targets for forced labor campaigns under a series of colonial rulers. Today’s youth remain at the bottom of the fiercely hierarchical and polarized societies of the Grassfields, and it is their response to centuries of exploitation that Nicolas Argenti takes up in this absorbing and original book. Beginning his study with a political analysis of youth in the Grassfields from the eighteenth century to the present, Argenti pays special attention to the repeated violent revolts staged by young victims of political oppression. He then combines this history with extensive ethnographic fieldwork in the Oku chiefdom, discovering that the specter of past violence lives on in the masked dance performances that have earned intense devotion from today’s youth. Argenti contends that by evoking the imagery of past cataclysmic events, these masquerades allow young Oku men and women to address the inequities they face in their relations with elders and state authorities today.

Plundering Africa's Past

Plundering Africa's Past
Author: Peter Ridgway Schmidt
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Total Pages: 302
Release: 1996-08-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780253210548

"An important book at a time when the booming illicit trade in African antiquities and the despoiling of some of the continent's prime archeological sites generate little concern in the art world." --Foreign Affairs "This benchmark publication challenges all of us to be part of the solution. Plundering Africa's Past cannot help but raise the level of discourse and consciousness about the looting problem, what needs to be done to stop it and about the relationship between Africa and the West." --African Studies Review "Plundering Africa's Past should be required reading for all archaeologists, historians, art historians, museum curators, and government officials involved in the cultural heritages of Africa, as well as most countries and continents with a disappearing past." --H-Net Book Review African government and museum officials, members of international agencies, academics, and journalists examine why the African past is disappearing at a rate perhaps unmatched in any other part of the world. Each looks at the international network of looting and trafficking from a different perspective. Here, for the first time, is a frank indictment of African contributions to the problem--voiced by the distinguished African essayists. The book concludes with a discussion of specific steps that could halt the disappearance of Africa's art and antiquities.