World is Africa: Writings on Diaspora Art

by Eddie Chambers

Overview

World is Africa brings together more than 30 important texts by Eddie Chambers, who for several decades has been an original and a critical voice within the field of African diaspora art history. The texts range from book chapters and catalogue essays, to shorter texts. Chambers focuses on contemporary artists and their practices, from a range of international locations, who for the most part are identified with the African diaspora. None of the texts are available online and none have been available outside of the original publication in which they first appeared.

The volume contains several new pieces of writing, including a consideration of the art world 'fetishization' of the 1980s, as the manifestation of a reluctance to accept the majority of Black British artists as valid individual practitioners, choosing instead to shackle them to exhibitions that took place three decades ago. Another new text re-examines the 'map paintings' of Frank Bowling, the Guyana-born artist who was the subject of a major retrospective at Tate Britain in 2019. The third introduces the little-known record sleeve illustrations of Charles White, the American artist who was the subject of a major retrospective in 2018 at major galleries across the US. Among the other new texts is a critical reflection on the patronage the Greater London Council extended to Black artists in 1980s London.

World is Africa makes a valuable contribution to the emerging discipline of black British art history, the field of African diaspora studies and African diaspora art history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781350140325
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	01/14/2021
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.75(d)

About the Author

Eddie Chambers is Professor in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Texas at Austin, USA. He has been writing about African Diaspora and Black British art practices for several decades and his scholarship includes Black Artists in British Art (I. B. Tauris, 2014) and Roots and Culture: Cultural Politics in the Making of Black Britain (I. B. Tauris, 2016).

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations xi

Foreword Patricia Bickers xv

Acknowledgements xxi

Introduction xxiii

Section 1 On Art History, Institutions, and Academia 1

1 Section One Introduction 3

2 The Harmful Consequences of Postblack 4

3 Africa 05: Polemic 7

4 Dead Artists' Society 10

5 Black Artists and the Fetishization of the 1980s 13

6 Black-British Artists and Problems of Systemic Invisibility and Eradication: Creating Exhibition Histories of That Which Is Not There 37

7 Framing Black Art 47

Section 2 History and Identity 53

8 Section Two Introduction 55

9 Handsworth Songs and the Archival Image 56

10 Black British and Other African Diaspora Artists Visualizing Slavery 66

11 2000's Got to be Black 76

12 Next We Change Earth - New Art Exchange, Nottingham 84

13 Keith Piper, Donald Rodney and the Artists' Response to the Archive 98

14 Photography 105

Section 3 On Artists 111

15 Section Three Introduction 113

16 Sokari Douglas Camp, CBE 114

17 William Kentridge: The Main Complaint 117

18 Hurvin Anderson: Double Consciousness 121

19 Jonathan Jones: untitled (the tyranny of distance) 128

20 Vanley Burke: An Inglan Story, An Inglan History 136

21 Helen Wilson: Painting for a Brighter Future 144

22 Barbara Walker: Private Face 148

23 Barbara Walker: 'It's a Bit Much' 152

24 Reviewpiece: Ajamu and Sunil Gupta 157

25 Pat Ward Williams: Isolated Incidents 160

26 Donald Rodney: Three Songs on Pain, Time & Light 163

27 Ben Jones: In the Spirit, In the Flesh 166

28 'There's No Place Like Home': The Enigma of Guyana in Frank Bowling's Map Paintings 170

29 Charles White's 10- and 12-Inch Vinyl Messages 187

30 Hew Locke's Depictions of Royalty: Some Considerations 200

Section 4 Black Artists in History 207

31 Section Four Introduction 209

32 Independence and Nation Building in Caribbean Art 210

33 Black Artists and the Greater London Council 214

34 'Art and Society': Jonathan Greenland Interview with Eddie Chambers 241

Section 5 Criticize 251

35 Section Five Introduction 253

36 Contemporary Art or Contemporary African Art?: The Inevitable Death of the Latter 254

37 Richard Hylton, The Nature of the Beast: Cultural Diversity and the Visual Arts Sector: A Study of Policies, Initiatives and Attitudes 1976-2006, Afterword 259

38 Black is a Color: (A History of African American Art): Book Review 261

39 Black My Story, (Museum De Paviljoens, Netherlands, 2003): Book Review 264

40 Criticize: Press Responses to Black Art an' done and The Pan-Afrikan Connection Exhibitions 267

Section 6 Outernational 283

41 Section Six Introduction 285

42 Àsìkò Goes Outernational 286

43 Jamaican Art Goes Outernational 289

Index 293