Contemporary African Art in a Global Context

As contemporary African artists, both of the continent and the diaspora, gain increased stature on the global art market, crucial questions arise: Are Western consumers reviving a colonial dynamic of resource extraction? Do private and institutional collectors pay sufficient heed to questions of memory, origin, and local history? What visual and narrative strategies should we use to document this global-minded generation of artists? This panel seeks to explore the stakes and the challenges of bringing African artists to an international stage, asking key questions about the future of art in a post-colonial context.

Moderators: Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw (Class of 1940 Bicentennial Term Professor in the Department of the History of Art and Director of the Arthur Ross Gallery) and Irma Flóra Kiss (Major in Department of the History of Art)

Panelists: Imani Roach (Director of the Brind Center for African and Afro-Diasporic Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art), Odili Donald Odita (Artist and Professor in the Tyler School of Art and Architecture at Temple University), and Vanicléia Silva Santos (Associate Curator of the African Collection at the Penn Museum).

This event is sponsored and organized by the Undergraduate Advisory Board in the History of Art Department at Penn.

Image credit: Odili Donald Odita, Sister Midnight, 2013, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 90 inches (254 x 228.6 cm).

Host or Publisher Arthur Ross Gallery, University of Pennsylvania