Early African Art: Difference between revisions

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In the next few minutes, join us on this journey through the History of Art in Africa

The history of art in Africa takes us back to the origins of humanity, the cradle of civilization, the first signs of human cognition, of interacting with the material world and creating visual symbols that represent and interpret them.

=====Traditional African Art=====

[https://www.artsy.net/gene/traditional-african-art]

A broad museological category for the traditional art of sub-Saharan Africa, this category brings together the diverse material culture (including everything from sculpture to textiles to everyday items) of hundreds of disparate groups across Africa. After centuries of being relegated to ethnological displays and curio cabinets, traditional African art entered into the European consciousness (and museums) as “art” at the turn of the 20th century, in part through its association with the European avant-garde.

=====A Look at Ancient African Art and Its Influence on Modern Works=====

[https://www.invaluable.com/blog/a-look-at-ancient-african-art-and-its-influence-on-modern-works/?srsltid=AfmBOorQ9IfTpCoa6VCfU6FUISr6PtpNK9Mxe1KZYXam8nV9R0H53kYR by invaluable]

Located on the southwest coast of Africa, the Apollo 11 caves housed slabs of rock displaying representations of animals. These works of African rock art were engraved in stone and painted in charcoal and red, yellow, and white pigments. Dating back to around 25,500 B.C.E., these stones are among the oldest known art objects from the entire African continent.

=====The Arts of Pre-Colonial Africa=====

[https://courtauld.ac.uk/research/frank-davis-memorial-lecture-series/the-arts-of-pre-colonial-africa/ by Frank Davis Memorial Lectures 2019 The Courtauld]

The 2019 Frank Davis Memorial Series invited four distinguished speakers to share new research in African art before the continent-wide colonialisation of the nineteenth century. Looking at the African material on its own terms rather than in light of Europe while also allowing us to understand the intercontinental and wider networks: the ways in which its various kingdoms centred themselves and connected with cultural worlds beyond.

=====African Art – Looking at African Artwork from Early Humankind to Today=====

[https://artincontext.org/african-art/ by Chrisél Attewell 26/8/21 ART IN CONTEXT]

Various fossils were unearthed at the Sterkfontein Caves, importantly the skull of an early human that has been named “Mrs. Ples”, found by John T. Robinson and Robert Broom in 1947. The skull is estimated to be over two million years old, and while it was thought to be a woman at first, some scientists have speculated that it was a male.

=====The earliest known form of African art is:=====

[https://brainly.com/question/21037443 by MAKE SCHOOL EASY WITH BRAINLY]

87% of students report better grades with Brainly

=====Unveiling Africa's Earliest Art=====

[https://www.tingatingaart.com/blogs/articles/unveiling-africas-earliest-art?srsltid=AfmBOooBQjC1CXVvSbpTkdOKXDAP8KFJPyg88ZZG5uREKdakRdCwJr6Q by TINGA TINGA ART 14/6/23]

=====Historical overview: from the 1600s to the present=====

[https://uen.pressbooks.pub/arth2720/chapter/need-african-art-section/ by uen]

Western trade with Africa was not limited to material goods such as copper, cloth, and beads. By the sixteenth century, the transatlantic slave trade had already begun, forcibly bringing Africans to the newly discovered Americas.

=====Sculpture and associated arts=====

[https://www.britannica.com/art/African-art/Sculpture-and-associated-arts by Frank Willett Britannica]

Although wood is the best-known medium of African sculpture, many others are employed: copper alloys, iron, ivory, pottery, unfired clay, and, infrequently, stone. Unfired clay is—and probably always was—the most widely used medium in the whole continent, but, partly because it is so fragile and therefore difficult to collect, it has been largely ignored in the literature. Small figurines of fired clay were excavated in a mound at Daima near Lake Chad in levels dating from the 5th century bce or earlier, while others were found in Zimbabwe in deposits of the later part of the 1st millennium CE.

=====Before the Renaissance: African Art in the Age of Antiquity=====

[https://www.monroeblackheritagemuseum.org/blog/african-art-in-antiquity by Art & Heritage]

Long before the first brushstroke of a Raphael or da Vinci, African artists were casting bronze, carving stone, and shaping spiritual and social life through forms of astonishing power and sophistication. While many museums and textbooks still trace the origins of “high art” to the European Renaissance, the truth is far older, more global—and far more African.

=====Unit 1: African art, an introduction=====

[https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-africa/african-art-introduction by Khan Academy]

Historical overviews of the art of Africa

=====African art before and after colonialism=====

[https://lasujoh.org.ng/storage/articles/O18N5237xNeTqRW5mlRZ71vR0QyvObQvcsXAl3Zh.pdf]

Africa is a vast continent of diverse cultures that manifest in everything they

do, and such cultural manifestations can be observed in their art, marriage,

kinship, law, among others. Based on this, this essay dwelt on African art, and

it was examined in two epochal periods, viz; before the advent of colonialism,

and after colonialism (during colonialism inclusive). Qualitative research

design was adopted for the study, using historical and descriptive approaches

=====Early African Art=====

[https://www.pinterest.com/garnerkristen/early-african-art/ by

Kristen Garner Pinterest]

=====History of African Art from Ancient Traditions to Modern Expression=====

[https://www.tilmagazine.com.ng/2025/05/history-of-african-art-from-ancient.html by TIL MAGAZINE 20/5/25]

African art history is one of the richest and most diverse visual traditions in the world, deeply embedded in the cultural, spiritual, and social fabric of the continent. The evolution of African art—from ancient carvings to modern installations—reflects a profound journey shaped by tradition, colonial disruption, and global recognition. From prehistoric rock paintings in Algeria’s Tassili n’Ajjer and South Africa’s Drakensberg Mountains, African artists have always used visual expression to document their world, celebrate rituals, and communicate with the spiritual realm. These early forms of traditional African art were far more than decorative, they were essential to survival, storytelling, and belief systems.

=====Unpacking Medieval African Art’s Profound Global Legacy=====

[https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-unpacking-medieval-african-arts-profound-global-legacy by Niama Safia Sandy 21/1/19 Art]

In popular discourse, the arts of Africa are positioned as having been discovered, interpolated, and folded into major Western art movements for the first time in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The rise of modern art was concurrent with the “Scramble for Africa,” which officially began at the Berlin Conference in 1884, when European powerheads divided and claimed ownership over the majority of the nearly 12 million square miles that comprise the continent.

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@@ Line 236: / Line 236: @@
 In the next few minutes, join us on this journey through the History of Art in Africa
 The history of art in Africa takes us back to the origins of humanity, the cradle of civilization, the first signs of human cognition, of interacting with the material world and creating visual symbols that represent and interpret them.
+=====Traditional African Art=====
+[https://www.artsy.net/gene/traditional-african-art]
+ A broad museological category for the traditional art of sub-Saharan Africa, this category brings together the diverse material culture (including everything from sculpture to textiles to everyday items) of hundreds of disparate groups across Africa. After centuries of being relegated to ethnological displays and curio cabinets, traditional African art entered into the European consciousness (and museums) as “art” at the turn of the 20th century, in part through its association with the European avant-garde.
+=====A Look at Ancient African Art and Its Influence on Modern Works=====
+[https://www.invaluable.com/blog/a-look-at-ancient-african-art-and-its-influence-on-modern-works/?srsltid=AfmBOorQ9IfTpCoa6VCfU6FUISr6PtpNK9Mxe1KZYXam8nV9R0H53kYR by invaluable]
+ Located on the southwest coast of Africa, the Apollo 11 caves housed slabs of rock displaying representations of animals. These works of African rock art were engraved in stone and painted in charcoal and red, yellow, and white pigments. Dating back to around 25,500 B.C.E., these stones are among the oldest known art objects from the entire African continent.
+=====The Arts of Pre-Colonial Africa=====
+[https://courtauld.ac.uk/research/frank-davis-memorial-lecture-series/the-arts-of-pre-colonial-africa/ by Frank Davis Memorial Lectures 2019 The Courtauld]
+ The 2019 Frank Davis Memorial Series invited four distinguished speakers to share new research in African art before the continent-wide colonialisation of the nineteenth century. Looking at the African material on its own terms rather than in light of Europe while also allowing us to understand the intercontinental and wider networks: the ways in which its various kingdoms centred themselves and connected with cultural worlds beyond.
+=====African Art – Looking at African Artwork from Early Humankind to Today=====
+[https://artincontext.org/african-art/ by Chrisél Attewell 26/8/21 ART IN CONTEXT]
+ Various fossils were unearthed at the Sterkfontein Caves, importantly the skull of an early human that has been named “Mrs. Ples”, found by John T. Robinson and Robert Broom in 1947. The skull is estimated to be over two million years old, and while it was thought to be a woman at first, some scientists have speculated that it was a male.
+=====The earliest known form of African art is:=====
+[https://brainly.com/question/21037443 by MAKE SCHOOL EASY WITH BRAINLY]
+% of students report better grades with Brainly
+=====Unveiling Africa's Earliest Art=====
+[https://www.tingatingaart.com/blogs/articles/unveiling-africas-earliest-art?srsltid=AfmBOooBQjC1CXVvSbpTkdOKXDAP8KFJPyg88ZZG5uREKdakRdCwJr6Q by TINGA TINGA ART 14/6/23]
+=====Historical overview: from the 1600s to the present=====
+[https://uen.pressbooks.pub/arth2720/chapter/need-african-art-section/ by uen]
+ Western trade with Africa was not limited to material goods such as copper, cloth, and beads. By the sixteenth century, the transatlantic slave trade had already begun, forcibly bringing Africans to the newly discovered Americas.
+=====Sculpture and associated arts=====
+[https://www.britannica.com/art/African-art/Sculpture-and-associated-arts by Frank Willett Britannica]
+ Although wood is the best-known medium of African sculpture, many others are employed: copper alloys, iron, ivory, pottery, unfired clay, and, infrequently, stone. Unfired clay is—and probably always was—the most widely used medium in the whole continent, but, partly because it is so fragile and therefore difficult to collect, it has been largely ignored in the literature. Small figurines of fired clay were excavated in a mound at Daima near Lake Chad in levels dating from the 5th century bce or earlier, while others were found in Zimbabwe in deposits of the later part of the 1st millennium CE.
+=====Before the Renaissance: African Art in the Age of Antiquity=====
+[https://www.monroeblackheritagemuseum.org/blog/african-art-in-antiquity by Art & Heritage]
+ Long before the first brushstroke of a Raphael or da Vinci, African artists were casting bronze, carving stone, and shaping spiritual and social life through forms of astonishing power and sophistication. While many museums and textbooks still trace the origins of “high art” to the European Renaissance, the truth is far older, more global—and far more African.
+=====Unit 1: African art, an introduction=====
+[https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-africa/african-art-introduction by Khan Academy]
+ Historical overviews of the art of Africa
+=====African art before and after colonialism=====
+[https://lasujoh.org.ng/storage/articles/O18N5237xNeTqRW5mlRZ71vR0QyvObQvcsXAl3Zh.pdf]
+ Africa is a vast continent of diverse cultures that manifest in everything they
+do, and such cultural manifestations can be observed in their art, marriage,
+kinship, law, among others. Based on this, this essay dwelt on African art, and
+it was examined in two epochal periods, viz; before the advent of colonialism,
+and after colonialism (during colonialism inclusive). Qualitative research
+design was adopted for the study, using historical and descriptive approaches
+=====Early African Art=====
+[https://www.pinterest.com/garnerkristen/early-african-art/ by
+Kristen Garner Pinterest]
+=====History of African Art from Ancient Traditions to Modern Expression=====
+[https://www.tilmagazine.com.ng/2025/05/history-of-african-art-from-ancient.html by TIL MAGAZINE 20/5/25]
+ African art history is one of the richest and most diverse visual traditions in the world, deeply embedded in the cultural, spiritual, and social fabric of the continent. The evolution of African art—from ancient carvings to modern installations—reflects a profound journey shaped by tradition, colonial disruption, and global recognition. From prehistoric rock paintings in Algeria’s Tassili n’Ajjer and South Africa’s Drakensberg Mountains, African artists have always used visual expression to document their world, celebrate rituals, and communicate with the spiritual realm. These early forms of traditional African art were far more than decorative, they were essential to survival, storytelling, and belief systems.
+=====Unpacking Medieval African Art’s Profound Global Legacy=====
+[https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-unpacking-medieval-african-arts-profound-global-legacy by Niama Safia Sandy 21/1/19 Art]
+ In popular discourse, the arts of Africa are positioned as having been discovered, interpolated, and folded into major Western art movements for the first time in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The rise of modern art was concurrent with the “Scramble for Africa,” which officially began at the Berlin Conference in 1884, when European powerheads divided and claimed ownership over the majority of the nearly 12 million square miles that comprise the continent.