Authentic/Ex-Centric : Conceptualism in Contemporary African Art

by Hassan, Salah; Oguibe, Olu; Coombes, Annie E.

• ISBN13: 9789076162065
• ISBN10: 9076162069
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-04-01
• Publisher: Distributed Art Pub (Dap)

Summary

Against the musty stereotypes and prejudices that still consider Africa a dark continent full of nameless, Third World nations always striving but never managing to catch up with the West, Authentic/Ex-Centric positions Africa as the source of many of the ideas associated with European modernism. From Cubism's radical abstraction to 70s performance art and its use of ritual, shamanism, and magic, the influence of African art has long been underap-preciated. Published in conjunction with an exhibition of the same name held to critical acclaim on the fringes of the 2001 Venice Biennale, Authentic/Ex-centric offers a glimpse of the ways in which African and African and African Diaspora artists have interpreted and translated the aesthetic and social experiences of post-colonial Africa into new idioms of artistic expression, and argues for their proper location in the broad narrative of global conceptualism. Including work by such artists as Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Willem Boshoff, Godfried Donkor, Rachid Koraichi, Berni Searle, and Yinka Shonibare.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. 5
Preface
Authentic/Ex-Centric: Conceptualism in Contemporary African Art	p. 10
: Self and Other in Contemporary African Art	p. 26
Strangers and Citizens	p. 50
Where, What, Who, When: A Few Notes on 'African' Conceptualism	p. 72
The FLAT Gallery: Conceptual Practices in Durban, South Africa	p. 84
Making/Breaking Bread: Willem Boshoff's Panifice	p. 102
Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons: 1990-2001	p. 122
Requiems for the Heavyweights: Race, Representation and Universality in the Art of Godfried Donkor	p. 144
Rachid Koraichi: A celestrial Architecture	p. 158
Skin Deep/Bodies of Evidence: The Work of Berni Searle	p. 178
The Visible and the Invisible: The Work of Zineb Sedira	p. 202
Tricking the Mind: The Work of Yinka Shonibare	p. 214
Bibliography	p. 230
Artists' Biographies	p. 237
List of Works in the Exhibition	p. 250
Index	p. 254
Notes on Contributors	p. 258
Acknowledgements	p. 262
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