Modern Art in Africa, Asia and Latin America: An Introduction to Global Modernisms - Paperback

by Elaine O'Brien (Editor), Everlyn Nicodemus (Editor), Melissa Chiu (Editor)

Shedding fresh light on modern art beyond the West, this text introduces readers to artists, art movements, debates and theoretical positions of the modern era that continue to shape contemporary art worldwide. Area histories of modern art are repositioned and interconnected towards a global art historiography.

• Provides a much-needed corrective to the Eurocentric historiography of modern art, offering a more worldly and expanded view than any existing modern art survey
• Brings together a selection of major essays and historical documents from a wide range of sources
• Section introductions, critical essays, and documents provide the relevant contextual and historiographical material, link the selections together, and guide the reader through the key theoretical positions and debates
• Offers a useful tool for students and scholars with little or no prior knowledge of non-Western modernisms
• Includes many contrasting voices in its documents and essays, encouraging reader response and lively classroom discussion
• Includes a selection of major essays and historical documents addressing not only painting and sculpture but photography, film and architecture as well.

Back Jacket

Shedding fresh light on the influence of modern art beyond the West, this timely anthology provides a much-needed corrective to the Eurocentric historiography of modern art, redefining it as a global rather than purely Western phenomenon and offering a more worldly and expanded view than any existing modern art survey.

Divided in to three sections focusing on the geographic areas that have often been left out of conversations around modernity, the volume brings together a selection of major essays and historical documents addressing not only painting and sculpture but photography, film and architecture as well. Section introductions, critical essays, and documents provide the relevant contextual material, link each narrative to other art histories in the book, supply essential background information, and guide the reader through the key theoretical positions and debates.

Bringing together narratives of modern art that have been scattered in area studies of Asian, African, and Latin American art history, the volume tells a more accurate story of the radical transformation associated with modernity worldwide and opens the subject up to cross-cultural comparison. Modern Art in Africa, Asia and Latin America also addresses often-neglected topics in modern art that are especially relevant to the study of postmodernity, such as modern art in diaspora, colonial art education and institutions, and pre-histories of new media, concepts, and methods. This is a useful tool for all students and scholars of non-Western modernisms which will encourage a deeper engagement with, and understanding of, modern art as a global phenomenon.

Author Biography

Elaine O'Brien is a Professor of Modern & Contemporary Art at California State University, Sacramento.

Everlyn Nicodemus is an artist and writer living and working in Edinburgh, UK, and holds a Ph.D. from Middlesex University, London.

Melissa Chiu is Museum Director and Vice President, Global Art Programs, Asia Society in New York.

Benjamin Genocchio is editor in chief of Art & Auction Magazine, New York. He holds a Ph.D. in art history and is the author and editor of six books.

Mary K. Coffey is Associate Professor of Art History at Dartmouth College.

Roberto Tejada is Distinguished Chair and Professor of Art History, Southern Methodist University.